The Problems of Your Future
by ElleMe
Summary: There was a big time jump in His Last Vow, so what happened during all that skipped time? How did John and Mary find their way back to each other and what role did Sherlock play in all of it? Involves all characters. Rated T for language and sexual situations later on.
1. Chapter 1

Sherlock's eyes slowly opened to the harsh white walls of his hospital room, and after seven days of repeating this uncomfortable ritual, he was finally able to wake up without suspicious uncertainly of his location furrowing his brow.

"Hey," John's voice quietly cut in, followed by the sound of his newspaper dropping onto the small beside table. "You were out a while."

"And you weren't," Sherlock nonchalantly replied, adjusting the angle of the bed so he could face John. "You've got bags the size of London under your eyes; you can barely keep them open."

"It's my shift," John said simply with a forced shrug. "Mrs. Hudson was here this morning, Molly in the afternoon. It's my turn."

"To sit here and watch me sleep?"

"To make you sure you're okay and that you don't need anything," John replied with annoyance. "Like it or not, there are people who actually care about you."

"Yes," Sherlock pondered. "There's a mystery for your blog."

"Already there." John smirked. "One of the more popular ones."

"Oh, good." Sherlock raised himself up a bit more and let out a heavy breath. "Well, thank you for forgoing your own sleep to observe mine, but you can go now."

"I'm not going," John answered back, picking up his newspaper to resume reading.

"Uh, yes. You are," Sherlock matter-of-factly decided, pushing his fists into the bed to lift his lower body up off of it.

"Nope. And don't do that. You're going to rip your stitches."

"John, you've been here since six o'clock this morning. You haven't slept, you haven't eaten. It's almost 7p.m., you need to go home. And if you're staying here to avoid Mary, then just go to Baker Street. I'm sure at least one of the shirts you've stashed over there are clean enough for you to wear out in public. Although I wouldn't recommend that option, Mrs. Hudson's probing questions are getting more superfluous every day."

John gave him a sore look, though he was secretly glad to see his friend feeling well enough to be his usual self. "Sherlock…how—"

"Please John, don't be impressed by this one. Your fatigue is apparent in your eyes, posture, and skin color; any toddler with a working set of pupils could see that. You've been here since six this morning because you're reading the newspaper. When Mrs. Hudson has the morning shift she takes it with her. She and the new boyfriend like to do the crosswords together. Ridiculous activity. Nothing more than an exhibition of how much obscure and utterly futile knowledge normal people allow their already struggling brains to accumulate. So, you got the newspaper this morning. You didn't read it, all the pages are still together in their original sequence. So, what were you doing here all day? Not sleeping. You were writing. Your computer is charging under your seat. Blogging? Maybe. But probably not. You're writing for your own sake, getting your emotions down. Clearly you've still got work to do because you're still avoiding Mary as evidenced by the fact that the shirt you have on is the shirt you wore two days ago. So, you're only leaving the hospital to change and when you do, it's at Baker Street where you have only a couple outfits to choose from."

John sat there with a dull expression on his face. "I wasn't going to ask how you knew. A blind monkey could see that I'm exhausted from being here all day."

"Oh…" Sherlock gave the subtlest apologetic shrug. "Reflex."

"What I was going to say, was…how can you possibly think I can go home? Mary is there."

"And you two still aren't talking."

"Since she shot you two weeks ago," John said incredulously. "No, probably not!"

"Well you're going to soon."

"Sorry?" John squinted.

"You and your wife, talk."

"I don't think so."

"Oh come on," Sherlock huffed.

"No come on," John interrupted, getting out of the chair and moving toward the detective. He knew his frustration was quick and misplaced, but it didn't stop it from coming out. "You really think I'm ready to forgive her for what she did?"

"I didn't say forgive, I said talk."

"Some would say the two aren't mutually exclusive."

"Some, yes."

"But not me?" John kicked himself for even responding.

"John," Sherlock said finitely, silencing his friend by throwing an open palm up. "Your pregnant wife felt she and your unborn child were in enough danger to justify shooting me. Have you really convinced yourself that you are going to completely keep your distance? Are you really not at all nervous about her safety?"

The doctor fell silent with hands planted firmly on his hips, desperate to hold onto at least some of his irritancy toward the hospitalized detective. He finally let out a heavy sigh. "I went over to our place last night, around midnight."

"Eh, 12:30."

John glared. "Yeah fine, 12:30."

"You hopped over the gate to avoid making a sound or waking up the neighbors, climbed up the fire escape ladder to your bedroom window, looked in, saw Mary sleeping and safe, and left the same way you got there. Probably had a run-in with Mrs. Bell's dog on your way out."

"I do have a key to my own flat, you know. I wasn't shimmying up drain pipes or whatever you're saying."

"Yes you were." Sherlock could barely hold back his smirk. He had been laid up in a hospital bed for too long and deducing the nurses was far too easy and incredibly boring. "You hopped over the gate, obviously. The gate is old and loud, Mary would hear it creek open. Plus you're favoring your left side, possible strained hamstring. My guess is you haven't been exercising in the midst of all this, so you hoped over the gate, landed unfavorably. The light orangey-red marks on the insides of your knuckles are rust strains from when you gripped the fire escape ladder. You probably have the same marks on the bottom of your shoes. Really unsafe fire escape, by the way. Call the landlord. Mrs. Bell's dog, well that one's just too easy. Friendly mutt, jumped up onto you when you reached the ground again. Misses you, I'm sure. There are two pulls in your shirt where the dogs paws would have been and short brown hairs on your trousers where the dog rubbed up against you. And finally, you were there at 12:30, not 12 because the sprinklers had just shut off. You still have some dried mud on your shoes which I assume happened when you hopped over the gate and into Mary's flower beds."

John stared in the way he so often did. "You're an arse."

"That's a far less impressive deduction." Sherlock gave his friend a small smile which, after a few seconds John finally returned. While the rest of his life had just been flipped upside down, it felt comforting to have some normalcy—even if that meant Sherlock irking him to no end with his deductions in endless attempts to prove how much smarter he was than everyone else around him. John made a mental note to bring Mycroft along on his next visit.

"I'll see you later," John said with a fading smile, and grabbed his laptop and went.

It was near nine o' clock when John finally made it back to his and Mary's flat. From the hospital, the trip was about a fifteen minute drive, but the hour and forty-five minutes John spent in the car park contemplating whether or not he could actually go through with seeing his wife set him back a bit. Standing at the door to the flat, he was fully prepared to engage in another hour of contemplation, but unfortunately that plan was foiled by a blubbering Kate emerging from her flat across the hall. Isaac was probably missing again. "Oh, John…" she stuttered, quickly trying to suppress the sobs. "I didn't see you there. Locked out, are you?"

"Oh, uh, no…no I'm not. I was just, eh…" he thought back two weeks prior. That's when it had all started; with Kate. He just had to go get Isaac, had to beat up Wiggins, had to run into Sherlock Holmes in a crack den, had to let the sociopath drag him into yet another ridiculous adventure. All this Magnusson business, it all started with Kate. John decided Kate didn't really care why he was outside his flat staring at the knob; she clearly had problems of her own. He nodded a quick "Goodnight" in her direction and let himself into his flat.

The door shut quietly behind him as he looked around from empty room to empty room. The chingle of the keys meeting the marble countertops in the kitchen resounded through the silent flat. John practically winced at their echo. His slow steps halted when he saw the sliver of yellow light beneath the door to his bedroom, his and Mary's bedroom. He stood up a little straighter, chest back the way his commanding officers had always told him when he was in the service and looked damn near ready for battle. Except for the nervous, fidgety rubbing of his fingers against his thumbs and tightness in his jaw, his determination to get this over with was clear.

He gently pushed the bedroom door open, the lamplight from the bedroom illuminating his increasingly hesitant expression. There was a lump huddled in the bed, which seemed to still as he took his first step toward it. "Mary…"

The lamp by her side of the bed lit up her blonde hair, but not her face, her face was turned down and away from him.

He swallowed hard and decided he couldn't be this way. He didn't want to be there, not even a little bit, but he had come for a reason. "I know you're not asleep," he sighed, dragging a chair from the corner up to the side of her bed. When he got close enough he finally saw her face.

Shining tear streams soaked her cheeks, running all the way down to her chin. From the looks of it, she had given up on wiping them hours ago. Her blue eyes were blurred by tears that had yet to make their escape. Mouth tightly shut as if to keep in any audible sounds of despair, which didn't matter now that John was looking right at her. But she didn't say a word. He had never seen another human being show so much emotional pain on their face.

Looking at Mary like this, he couldn't help wishing she wasn't in so much pain. And having this thought made him incomprehensibly angry with himself. He was furious at her! She lied to him, and not about some small, irrelevant detail of her past. She shot his best friend! He was absolutely livid with his wife and with his life, and yet here he was feeling sorry for her.

"What do you want, John?" he finally heard her say, though her eyes did not move. She couldn't look at him.

"I…" he started, but didn't know where to go next. What did he want anyway?

"Did Sherlock tell you to come?" she asked, and sat up in the bed wiping away what she could of the mess on her face. She brought her knees up to her chest and rested her arms on top, genuinely worried about what her husband had come to say.

John's gaze lowered to the skirt around the bed. "He told me to come and talk to you, to figure something out I guess."

Mary nodded. "He said he would."

"Wha—" John's head snapped up. "… He said…When did—"

"I didn't ask him to," Mary quickly cut in. "I swear." John bit down on his cheek and sent a confused look at her. "I went to see him. He texted me asking if I could come by the hospital, so I did."

"What'd he have to say?"

Mary looked up at the man in the repositioned armchair, elbows tiredly perched on his knees. "He wanted me to know he understands. And that he isn't angry about what happened, about what…I did."

"Well…that makes one of us. Naturally, the sociopathic one."

Mary scoffed. "Oh please, you and I both know he isn't a sociopath. He likes to say he is, makes it easier for him to try to be one."

"I didn't come here to talk about Sherlock Holmes," John retorted firmly.

"Then why did you come here?" she threw back, just as firmly as he did, but regrettably with a slight crack in her voice. "To make sure I'm feeling the right amount of self-loathing? Or to see if I have any weapons stashed in the pantry or an escape pod in the loo? Or was it just to collect the rest of your things to move back into Baker Street? What is it, John?"

"You're getting angry with me?!" John yelled. "You have no right to be angry with me!"

"I know!"

"You lied to—" He stopped when he heard her agree.

Mary's hands came quickly to her face to hide new tears she couldn't keep in. "I am not angry with you John, and I am well aware I have no right! What I did was terrible, lying to you and shooting Sherlock, I wish none of it happened. And even though what Sherlock said was true…about you being attracted to a certain kind of life…If I could undo it, I would. All of it. And I know you have every right to hate me, and I wouldn't blame you if you do."

John was quiet for a long time, or at least what seemed like a long time. It could have been two seconds. Neither could tell. "I haven't been sleeping."

"Hm, what's that like?" Mary sarcastically countered, her voice gentler now.

"For all the obvious reasons, but also because…" she looked toward him when he paused. "Well, you might as well know. I'm worried about how safe you are here."

"What?" She was puzzled. "How safe I am?"

"Magnusson is dangerous, and—"

"I know he is, that's why I was…"she trailed off, deciding it was best not to remind John of the incident, though she reasoned that she probably didn't need to. It was almost certainly on his mind every time he looked at her. "I'll be fine," she resolved simply.

"I'm not moving out," John blurted, surprising himself and his wife. "And don't you dare think for a minute it's because I'm ready to work things out or that I'm ready to forgive you because I'm not. I don't even know how to talk to you about any of this."

"Okay," she breathed, still unsure of what he was doing.

"But you are carrying my child, and I need to know that he or she is safe. So, I'm staying here. I'll put all of my things in the spare bedroom.

Mary furrowed her eyebrows, pushing a still-confused wrinkle between them. "So, you're going to live here? Still? After what happened?"

"It's not for you, it's for the baby," he reminded her. Although, as hurt as he was, he knew that statement wasn't entirely true.

"Is that why you came last night?" Mary asked.

Slightly embarrassed, her husband nodded once. "I didn't think you heard me." She looked away from him and down at the bed sheets. When she first heard the fire escape hit the side of the house she was scared it was someone not so interested in checking to make sure she was safe, but when she saw John's silhouette in the window a small part of her hoped he would come in. Of course, he didn't. "Right then." John stood and pushed the armchair back to its place in the corner. "I'm going to bed."

Mary nodded and sunk back down into her sheets. She was just about the flick off the lamp when John cleared his throat at the bedroom door. She could tell he wanted her attention, but he wasn't saying anything. "John?"

"I don't hate you," he uttered. And then was gone.


	2. Chapter 2

"So, how's the living arrangement working out?" Sherlock inquired sipping hospital orange juice through a pink straw that just barely reached his lips.

"Do you need the bed adjusted?" Mary lightly deflected, taking note of his struggle and reaching for the juice.

"No, I'm not really drinking it," he answered quietly. "Mrs. Hudson brought it insisting I hydrate. I told her I don't need to; I've got more monitors on me than Mycroft's lunch dates. If something goes even slightly wrong, we'll know."

"You _do_ need to, young man," Mrs. Hudson reprimanded, emerging from her magazine on the opposite side of the room.

"My body is 60% water, skipping the orange juice will not be detrimental to my health."

"Well, it'll be detrimental to my patience." She flipped to a new page after a finite nod and her eyes lit up. "Mary, what about this one?"

Mary peered over from her place at the foot of the bed to see a picture of a pram Mrs. Hudson's finger eagerly lay upon. "Oh, we won't have to buy the big things for a while."

"She's only ten weeks," Sherlock put in.

The blonde's head whipped back around to him. "I didn't tell you that."

"Yes you did. Just not verbally."

"Don't tell me you were at the conception," she joked, getting a bit nervous when he didn't immediately deny it.

Sherlock shook his head. "I knew you were pregnant at your wedding, is it really so hard to believe I could have deduced how far along you were?"

"Someone told you."

"It was a simple matter of observing your moods, physical appearance, and—"

"Fibbing, Sherlock," she cut him off.

"A quick examination of the calendar in your phone—"

"You went to see my doctor, didn't you," she finally guessed, giving him a scolding look.

A sulking frown contorted Sherlock's lips. "You really should find a more discreet doctor." Mary smirked and shook her head at him, touched by his curiosity. "And while we're on the subject of discretion, you never answered my question. How are the living arrangements? It's been two weeks, I would have expected a report by now. "

Mary looked down into her hands, searching for a way to describe the experience. "It's been…odd."

When she didn't continue, Sherlock studied her and then turned to Mrs. Hudson who was obliviously 'oohing' and 'ahhing' over something in the baby catalogue; no doubt reveling in the eventual arrival of what would be the closest thing to a grandchild she would ever have. "Mrs. Hudson," he said, returning his gaze to a shifting Mary. "Give us a minute, would you."

"Oh, of course," she shuffled to her feet, tucking the catalogue under her arm. "I'll run down to the cafeteria. Mary," she touched the other woman's shoulder gently on her way by. "Do you want me to pick up something for you?"

"Oh no, I'm fine." She smiled at the sweetness of the older lady, who had also _somehow_ forgiven her for what happened. 'Life is complicated' was all Mrs. Hudson had said when she heard the whole of it all.

Mrs. Hudson patted her arm. "I'll be back with another juice for you, Sherlock. Finish the other while I'm gone."

When she had disappeared, Mary breathed a heavy sigh. "He's there, but he isn't," she began. "We see each other at work, of course, but I try to stay out of his way. And then he usually comes home a few hours after I do with nothing to say. We'll go days without a word and then he'll just out of the blue ask me if I'm feeling okay or he'll cook dinner and hand me a plate. Or last week, he checked my blood pressure. I have no idea what's going to happen, Sherlock, but I suppose him being there is better than him not being there."

Sherlock nodded. "Well, you know John, always a bit of a drama queen that one. Remember when he thought I was dead. God, I had to stage another near-death experience to get him to forgive me."

"Sometimes I wonder whether or not he would even consider staying married to me if I wasn't pregnant," she said sadly, unconsciously moving a hand to her stomach.

"He would."

"Yes, and of course you're the expert on relationships," she sarcastically returned, and rubbed at the headache forming over her eye. With a heavy sigh, Mary pushed herself off of the bed. "I think I'd better go, not feeling great."

"Makes sense," Sherlock said with a suspicious sniff. "Hospitals are basically Petri dishes of illnesses and ailments all congealing together."

She leaned over and kissed him lightly on the cheek. "Drink your orange juice. And don't let Mrs. Hudson send out for any prams just yet."

"I'll do my best."

"Bye Sherlock." Mary gave a small smile and left the room. Her visits with Sherlock were one of the few things keeping her sane these days. One of the few things giving her hope that she and John could somehow work it out. Somehow.

OOOOO

Three in the morning was rarely kind to John who, on this particular occasion, and much to his own embarrassment, was spending the time running through the events of the night Sherlock had been shot. He'd done it countless times since it happened, and tonight the mental topic of discussion was what he could have done differently.

'Skip tending to Janine,' he thought. 'She was fine, breathing and that. In no real danger.'

He took a swig from the nearly empty water bottle on the nightstand next to his bed—the spare bed in the spare bedroom. The room that was supposed to eventually be the nursery.

'Go upstairs before Sherlock and find Mary first,' he reasoned next. 'She wouldn't have shot me.'

For a moment his brain had the audacity to question that, but he knew the notion was a ridiculous one. She shot Sherlock to keep John from finding out about her. But she would never pull the trigger on her husband. He knew that. Despite every other doubt in his mind tonight, he knew _that_.

He was going to continue on with the hypothetical and fixed version of the fateful night, but was brought out of it by a muffled 'clang' coming from the kitchen. He waited a moment and heard slow footsteps move across the tile. He jumped out of bed faster than he ever had and grabbed gun out of the nightstand drawer. Sneaking carefully out of the bedroom, he made his way toward the kitchen and upon hearing another clang sprang unafraid from his place behind the wall with his gun firmly pointed at the noisemaker. "Hey!"

Mary turned, saw the gun and let out a stunned but quick scream. "John!" The name was cut off by the shattering of glass on the kitchen floor, apparently from the glass she had been holding. "Oh God," she gasped, grabbing her chest and bending down to collect the smashed bits of the cup. Sure she was a trained assassin and knew how to keep her composure in the face of shock, but she hadn't exactly been around gun pointing for a few years now, and especially was not accustomed to seeing her husband on the other end of the barrel.

John immediately dropped the weapon on the counter and breathed his own relieved breath. "Jeez Mary, I thought you were…I heard a noise, I didn't realize it was you in here." He joined her in picking up the broken pieces on the tile. "I got this," he said, pulling her to her feet while he resumed the cleanup.

"What were you doing?" Mary's voice was still a bit shaky.

"I thought someone had broken in," he answered, going to the closet to grab the vacuum. The rest of the glass was sucked up in no time and after a brief check to make sure no shards were still stuck to their socks, Mary and John found themselves sitting at the kitchen table. Silently.

"What are you doing up so late?" Mary asked, twirling a spoon through a bowl of what looked to be chocolate ice cream and hot fudge—the reason for her 3 a.m. trip to the kitchen.

"Couldn't sleep," he replied shortly. "You?"

She motioned toward the bowl with a shy but unsmiling look. "Craving." John mouthed an 'oh' and wondered how often she did this. And how he had missed it all the other times.

"Do you…uh," he stammered, feeling like a fool. Obviously he wanted to know how her pregnancy was going, but didn't know how to ask without showing that he missed her. He brought his chin close to his neck and cleared his throat. "Have you had a lot of cravings?"

Surprised by the attempt at conversation, Mary stammered a bit herself. "Um, nothing too crazy yet. No pickles in pie or anything like that. Just been hungrier than usual, and at some strange times."

"Oh…alright." More silence.

Mary watched John's eyes avoid hers as he searched for something else to say. "John…"

"Hm?" he responded, feeling more awkward than he should.

"Maybe we can have this rule," she started, dropping the spoon into the bowl and resting her hands in her lap.

"What rule?"

"Well, not a rule exactly…but an understanding." John wasn't quite catching on. "I know you are nowhere close to forgiving me or for being able to move on from all of this. But the baby is…well, both of ours. And you are a doctor and you are…you, and I know you worry. So, if you want—and this is only if you want to—you should feel like you can ask about the pregnancy…and the baby. There's not much to report now, but still."

Something warm fluttered in John's stomach when he heard that; it was a feeling he had not had in weeks. He couldn't smile outwardly, but something did on the inside. "Okay."

"And I won't assume anything or make it difficult for you to know things. And like I said, this is if you want to be involved—not that you need to be _involved_ , but if you want to hear about—"

"Mary," he interrupted. "I do want to know about those things. I want to be able to ask about it."

"Oh, okay," she exhaled, relief evident. "Well good."

"And I want to go to the doctor's appointments," he forced out before his mind could tell him not to.

"You do?" Utter surprise.

"Yes, I want to know that the doctors taking care of my child are doing what they need to do." He brought his hands together atop the table. "Besides, this," he said motioning between them. "It's not its fault. The baby I mean."

"No," she felt an all-too-familiar tickle in her nose bring what she felt was a pathetic tear to her eye. "It isn't." She blinked away the tear and sniffed before it could get any worse. "Sorry." They sat a bit longer, neither knowing what else could be said and too tired to rack their brain trying to think of something. "The next appointment is Wednesday," Mary at last stated, rising from the table and taking her bowl with her.

"Next Wednesday?"

"Mmhm," she murmured. "At 11:30."

"Still Dr. Marshall?" Mary gave another affirming nod. "I'll meet you there."

"Okay," she wanted to at least say 'goodnight' before she disappeared back into the bedroom they used to share, but the tension between them didn't really welcome the sentiment. So, she just turned and went.

John couldn't bring himself to go back into the spare bedroom. If Mary had been getting up during the nights to eat and he had only heard her this one time then clearly he would be no use to anyone breaking in to the flat, especially if they were trying to remain undetected. He reclaimed his gun from the kitchen counter and moseyed over to the couch. "As good as a bed I suppose," he mumbled to himself, rearranging the pillows a bit. He settled down into it and tucked the weapon underneath the sofa, right by where his hand would hang. Oddly enough, sleep came more easily to him here and he was out before his mind could start up again with the hypothetical replays of what could have happened the night at Magnusson's office.

OOOOO

"Where is it?" Molly demanded, searching the hospital room. She checked under magazines, under the mattress, in the loo, even the overnight bag from when he was first brought in and couldn't find what she was looking for anywhere.

"You won't find it because it's not here," Sherlock enunciated. "John, make her leave."

"Nope," his friend shortly replied. "We know it's here and you, you bloody addict, are going to tell us where it is. You're supposed to be here getting better, that means relaxing."

"What's going on in here?" the high breathy voice of Mrs. Hudson asked, interrupting Molly's search. She had just returned from the gift shop with a box of chocolates for herself.

"He's been solving cases!" Molly tattled. "He's got a phone in here somewhere connecting him to clients and he won't tell us where it is."

"I gave you one big clue," Sherlock grumbled and they all turned to him. "It's NOT here."

"You're lying," John said with zero doubt inflecting the words.

"Fine, keep looking. Go nuts. You won't find anything."

Molly narrowed her eyes and stared at him hard. "Let's see…if I were Sherlock Holmes, where would I hide a phone." Sherlock stared right back at her. "It'd have to get to you some way."

John's eyes scanned the room, finally shifting to a teddy bear that sat on his bedside table holding a 'Get Well Soon' sign. "Probably in plain sight."

"What?" Sherlock turned to John.

"That's where you'd hide it, in plain sight," John repeated, making his way over to the teddy bear. Sherlock sighed and hung his head, realizing he'd been busted and powerless to stop it. John reached into his back pocket for his Swiss army knife and with one quick switch of the blade, grabbed the bear and opened the back of it. "Really, Mate?" he exhaustedly chided, holding up the phone for Molly and Mrs. Hudson to see. "In the bear?"

"I've been here two months, I'm going mad with boredom!" the detective shouted defensively.

"Tough," John asserted. "You can't be working cases while you're in the hospital."

"Why not?!"

"Because you're supposed to be recovering," John shot back. "And if you do happen to stumble onto something that's dangerous—and we all know that is a very real possibility" he emphatically motioned his arms toward the hospital bed to illustrate the point, "then whoever your case-cracking winds up busting will know exactly where to find you. And you aren't exactly ready to go head-to-head with any criminals."

"Who got you the phone?" Molly demanded.

"Who got you the new earrings?"

"My mum," she rushed. "Tell us!"

"Hm, nope. Try again."

"Sherlock, don't be a cock," John helped, to no avail.

"She's just on edge because her semi-steady boyfriend hasn't called in a week. Suspected cheating going on."

"Oh, shut up!" Molly yelled. "Stop trying to get out of trouble."

"You bought yourself new earrings, painted your nails and are wearing mascara. You're meeting him for lunch today and want him to think you're also seeing someone else. You also want him to want to have sex with you."

"Sherlock, manners!" Mrs. Hudson gasped.

"Perfume on the chest. Excites mating instincts and forces the attention of multiple senses to the breasts. Word of advice, break it off. He hasn't been cheating, he's a wanted man. Avoiding you in order to avoid going out in public where he may be identified." They all stared at him in the usual annoyed and dumbfounded way. "Solved that case two days ago."

Molly let out a low growl through clenched teeth and stormed out of the room, taking her purse with her. "Oh, Molly…" Mrs. Hudson cooed, going after her.

"Well, you haven't lost a step when it comes to pissing her off," John scathed, feeling sorry for Molly. "You need to know when to turn it off."

"If I did you probably wouldn't even know you're going to be a father yet." Sherlock exhaled sharply from all the excitement. "Besides, she'll be back. She just needs to cool off."

"Um, I'm pretty sure I would know about the baby by now, and I mean it. Molly was just trying to help." He sat down on the edge of the bed. "You can't be solving cases while you're laid up like this. It's stupid and you know it."

"Mary's only fourteen weeks pregnant, you probably wouldn't have known for at least a couple more weeks."

"The fact that she's vomiting every morning might have tipped us off. And stop trying to change the subject." John folded his arms across his chest and realized something. "You said fourteen weeks?"

"Yes."

"You're keeping track of her pregnancy?" He let a tiny smile show, having caught Sherlock Holmes in what seemed like dedicated affection.

"Got nothing else to do."

"Except solve cases against the wishes of your friends."

Sherlock sighed and rolled his eyes. "I haven't taken anything dangerous. Little petty things, that's all. A banker who quit his job because he could make more money begging, didn't tell his girlfriend. A wife with a secret child who awkwardly happened to move into the flat next door. A ginger whose apprentice took him to town—remind me to tell you about that one by the way, the whole thing was assembled around hair."

"Wiggins brought you the bear with the phone sewn in, didn't he?" John questioned accusingly, ignoring the recap of unauthorized cases.

Sherlock hesitated at first, but soon gave in knowing it wouldn't make a difference. "Yes."

"Didn't you tell me Mary brought you that teddy bear?"

"Yes. I lied."

"Why'd you lie?"

"Because if you knew Wiggins brought the bear you would have been suspicious. If you thought Mary brought the bear then you probably wouldn't have looked at it much, and if you did look at it you'd be too busy thinking about everything there is to think about in that department to wonder why in the world I would keep a 'Get Well Soon' bear in my room."

It made perfect sense. John probably should have given the bear more thought. "So, you get cases on your phone and then…what? You sew it back up and set it down on the nightstand? How?"

"Needle and thread's stuffed in the pillow case. The nurses here are incredibly slow."

"And you're incredibly thick-headed," John finished for him, getting off the bed and making his way toward the window. "You can't be solving new cases while you recover from the last one."

"If you recall, I haven't solved the last one yet," Sherlock objected. "Magnusson is still out there."

John tensed up at that name, a slew of horrible possibilities involving his wife and the man in question assembling in his mind. "Give it time. Wait until you're out of here."

"Fine," Sherlock pushed out, teeth tight against his lip.

"When's that going to be by the way?" He was sure he had heard a mention of it, but couldn't remember.

"Hopefully by the end of the month."

John immediately turned away from the window and came back to Sherlock's bedside. "That soon?"

"Hopefully."

"I heard you talking on the phone to your parents the other day, you said you wouldn't be out until late autumn."

"So?" Sherlock shrugged. "And if you thought you knew why did you ask?"

"I wasn't sure; I've had a lot of things on my mind." Obviously.

"Mycroft and I decided it would be best to wait to tell the parents. Last time we spoke, Mum mentioned something about getting the family together when I got home and being thankful for something or another." He shook his head at the thought. "In any case, neither of us can spare the time for that sort of thing now so we're pushing it back."

"You're going to let your parents think you're still in the hospital when you're not?" John should have been more surprised than he was.

"Makes life easier."

"Not for them."

"So," Sherlock said, ready to change the subject. "How was the appointment?"

"Sorry, what appointment?"

"Your doctor's appointment. You went with Mary last Wednesday, didn't you? I was sure you'd mention it by now, but seeing that you haven't—"

"Do you two talk every day?" John incredulously cut in, making Sherlock wonder if he had crossed some socially conventional line.

"Who, me and Mary?"

"You and—yes, of course you and Mary!"

"More like every other day."

"Well jeez, when's the wedding? Are you going to ask _me_ to be your best man as well? I'd have quite the speech," John taunted. Of course he didn't mean it, but he couldn't help giving a bit of sass. He knew he was sensitive to any mentions of Mary, but that didn't mean he was going to be mature about it.

"Well, she needs to talk to someone, John," Sherlock stated firmly. "She's a pregnant, ex-intelligence agent being blackmailed by the most dangerous and remorseless man in the country, and her husband still can't talk to her about anything because she—regrettably—shot his best friend. Bearing all this in mind, one can conclude that she might have quite a bit to say."

"I'm sorry, Sherlock. I'm just…"

"I know." The two men let the silence hang in the air a bit. "She's not angry with you. She actually is pretty amazed you didn't move back into Baker Street. A little fuzzy on why you've been sleeping on the couch, though."

"It's in the middle of the flat. I can hear things better when I'm in there."

"I assumed."

John breathed out a long, exasperated sigh. "The appointment went well; the baby's growing like it should. We haven't found out the sex yet. The doctor said Mary's blood pressure is a little high which I knew because I've been monitoring it when I can. And uh," John paused, taking a seat in the chair by Sherlock's bed. A small, nearly undetectable smile crept on his face as he stared at a stitch in his jeans. "We got to hear the heartbeat." The smile grew just a little when he looked back up at his friend. "It was amazing. I've done ultrasounds for patients before; I've seen the way they get. But I have never heard something so incredible in my life. It was just…the most beautiful sound. Mary cried. I knew she would. She's been pretty emotional lately, what with the hormones. I, heh, I didn't have that excuse," a light chuckle escaped his lips. "My hormones are fine. And when we left, I excused myself. Said I had to take a call. And…" he stopped and dropped his head. "I know, this makes no sense to you. You don't get this stuff."

Sherlock's expression had softened a great deal from its usual composed and stern state. "Don't underestimate the power of observation."

John looked up and smiled a real smile this time. "It really was amazing."

"I believe you." Sherlock returned the smile with his own and gazed toward the teddy bear. The 'Get Well Soon' sign was stupid and probably Wiggins' idea of humor. What John had just told him was much more motivational as far as how soon Sherlock would need to get well. After all, he made a vow.

John noticed his friend glancing at the bear. "Uh-uh." He rose to his feet and confiscated it. "This is coming with me."

OOOOO

John didn't have to go into work the next morning. He'd taken the day off. However, around the time his alarm would normally go off, he was awoken by another sound. A very unpleasant sound. Opening his eyes to investigate, he was immediately blinded by the glare coming through the living room window (as he'd apparently forgotten to draw the blinds last night.) He rose from the couch, the usual aches and cramps nudging at his sore muscles, and heard the sound repeated. It was Mary heaving in the bathroom. This had happened every morning this week and every morning he sat on the couch and listened, but didn't dare go into the bathroom. He wouldn't know what to do. How could he comfort someone with whom he was still so angry? So he sat.

He stared at the open door into the bedroom and finally saw Mary cross from the bathroom back into bed. He let go of a relieved sigh he hadn't realized he was holding in. However, two brief seconds later he saw Mary rush back into the bathroom and heard the vomiting resume.

"Why does John get up while you're throwing up if he isn't going to help you?" Sherlock had asked Mary last time they spoke of this.

"He worries," she had told him, fully aware of the ritual John had when she was enduring morning sickness. "He wants to help, but he can't. He isn't ready to forgive me."

Of course, John wasn't aware Mary knew he woke up every day she was sick. He remained on the couch with elbows digging into his knees and his head in his hands waiting for the vomiting to stop. Part of him wished she would call him over so he wouldn't have to make the decision to go himself. But what would he do? How would he even help?

Finally, the heaves stopped. He looked up to see Mary coming out of the bedroom looking pale and miserable. She didn't even notice him on the couch. She just went to the sink and poured herself a glass of water. Holding herself up with one hand on the counter, she sipped slowly, closing her eyes after every swig. "Can I get you anything?" he asked, jolting her just a tad.

She shook her head. "No, no, I'm fine."

He fumbled around with a string hanging off his t-shirt. "Don't sound it."

"It's just morning sickness," she brushed off, placing the empty glass in the sink and bracing herself for a second before turning back around to face him. "I'm going to sleep it off."

She returned to the bedroom and crawled back under the comforter, desperately hoping the nausea would subside. She felt terrible, absolutely awful, and didn't see how there could be anything left in her stomach to purge. Falling back asleep proved to be impossible, though, despite the fact that she was exhausted from puking for nearly an hour now. Under the sheets her hand gently rubbed her stomach. "You're not mad at me too, are you?"

A light knock came at the open bedroom door. "Mary," John greeted her softly. "I, uh, brought you some toast and tea." He came over to her side of the bed with the plate and set it down next to her. "It'll help your stomach."

Mary looked down at the plate and then back up at him, incredibly touched by her husband's gesture. She felt her lips tighten and begin to quiver, and she immediately kicked herself for allowing the hormones to take over once again. Overcome with emotion and unable to dam it, she let the first tears fall. "God," she berated herself, shaking her head against the outburst and desperately trying to wipe away the tears. "I'm sorry John."

"No, Mary…it's okay." Now he felt terrible too, he hadn't meant to upset her. He may have still been angry with her, but he didn't want his already sick wife to feel worse. "Oi…" He sat down on the edge of the bed and put a hand on her arm. It was the first warm touch between them since the incident.

She wanted to stop crying, but she just couldn't. "It isn't fair. I was horrible to you. I lied to you. And now I'm sick and puking my guts out and you don't want to be here and don't have to be here, but you stay anyway. You sit up every morning while I'm throwing up…And you bring me toast and tea and try to make me feel better…"

"Mary, please don't cry." His grip on her arm tightened just a bit. "I didn't bring this to you to make you feel guilty. You're sick. I want to help if I can."

"Ughh," she groaned at herself. "I swear I don't mean to be this crazy and emotional!"

"Shhh, you can't get all worked up," John reminded her. "You have to keep your blood pressure down remember." The thought of harming the baby in any way was enough to make her calm down and a few slow breaths later, she had gotten the tears to let up. Embarrassed, she wiped the remnants from her cheeks with the sleeve of her pajamas. "There you go."

After a couple more suppressed whimpers and sniffs, she looked into her husband's eyes. "Why are you doing this?"

"Doing what?"

"This. Trying to help…you usually just sit in the living room and wait for me to be done being sick."

"It's morning sickness," he said. "And as the person that got you pregnant, I do feel a little responsible for you constantly vomiting when you wake up or any time you smell something."

"The perfume on that older lady patient yesterday did me in after a minute and a half," Mary admitted. "Couldn't even take her temperature. I threw up in the waste bin right in front of her."

"I know…she filed a complaint."

"Did she?" John nodded. "Old brute."

John adjusted himself so that he was more on the bed, catching the picture on the night stand in the process. It was from the wedding. It was Sherlock, Mary, and him at the reception after the arrest of the photographer. "Mary, I may be very angry with you still…and most days I really can't bring myself to talk to you because there isn't much to keep me from exploding and saying things that I know I shouldn't." He met her eyes again. "But I don't want to see you in pain and I don't want you to be miserable."

"I know," she said quickly and truthfully. "It's just not easy."

John nodded in agreement at the obvious fact, but then quickly got up and began rummaging through the top drawer of the dresser. "I'm going to check your blood pressure now."

 **A/N: Please let me know what you think, and thank you for reading!**


	3. Chapter 3

"Good Morning brother dear," Mycroft's manicured voice delivered, strolling into Sherlock's hospital room.

The younger Holmes, who was standing by the window buttoning the cuffs on his shirt, preparing for his departure, turned around slowly. "What are you doing here?"

"I just came to see you on the big day."

"It's hardly momentous." Sherlock finished with the cuffs and went to the closet for his suit jacket.

"Yes, I'm sure. Though it is refreshing to see you in actual clothes. Two months now we've all had to endure the sight of you in polka-dotted hospital gowns."

"Two and a _half_ months…" Sherlock corrected, and then threw his brother a sarcastic glare. "Sorry it was so rough on you." The detective reached one arm into the jacket, but winced when he tried to put the other in, feeling an unpleasant pull on the scar tissue of his still healing bullet wound. He decided to forgo the coat altogether.

Mycroft twirled his cane around once and carried on with logistics. "Well, first things first. We need to find you a place to stay."

"Excuse me?"

"Oh, you can't stay at Baker Street," he calmly revealed.

"Actually, I think I can."

"No, you can't," Mycroft reiterated. "Mrs. Hudson has gone on holiday with that gentleman she's been seeing. They aren't expected back for another three weeks."

"Three week vacation with a man she's only just met? That's a rather large sum of money to put into an uncertain relationship." Sherlock straightened his collar a bit.

"They've been dating almost as long as you've been in hospital," Mycroft reasoned. "And it's no secret he's a wealthy man. Real estate magnate."

"Media mogul," the younger brother quickly shot back.

"Going by what?"

"Last week Mrs. Hudson mentioned she'd started watching a new show on a network she was completely unaware of until about two months ago. Clearly the man is a higher-up for that network and got her to check it out."

"The new show is a documentary style series on evolving architecture outside the city. Have you ever known Mrs. Hudson to be interested in architecture or anything outside the city?" Mycroft returned, sending the metaphorical deduction ball back to Sherlock.

"She's wearing a new scent these days. It's extremely strong and honestly terrible. A man whose paycheck relies on client satisfaction would never risk smelling so overpowering. A media tycoon, on the other hand, wants to be noticed and overpowering. Wants people to know there is someone making him smell faintly of women's perfume." Sherlock smugly smirked at his elder brother. "Your turn."

Mycroft's face also held a smug smile. "The man she's dating is sixty-five, or so I estimate based on the meals ordered during last few dinner dates she's relentlessly been mentioning to me."

"So?"

"How many sixty-five year old men do you know in the media business who don't get pushed out by younger, handsomer faces?"

Sherlock jutted his lower jaw forward, not appearing to have an answer. "There could be some."

"Balance of probability, Sherlock."

Sherlock inwardly cursed his brother and went on collecting his things to prepare for his at-long-last departure from the hospital. "It doesn't matter; I'm going back to my flat. Mrs. Hudson being away will make it more peaceful anyhow."

"Mrs. Hudson being away will make it nearly impossible for you to get back on your feet."

"Back on my feet? What do you think I've been doing for the past two and a half months? Look, I'm on my feet right now."

"Even if you could take care of yourself for the next few weeks it wouldn't matter, 221B Baker Street is being fumigated."

"What?" Sherlock said through clenched teeth.

"There were roaches found," Mycroft smoothly informed, in his lazy tone. "So inconvenient. Not to worry though, I was assured nothing but the deadliest legal chemicals available would be used to eradicate the pests. Unfortunately that means no one can go into the flat for the time being."

"Mycroft, I swear…"

"All your things were moved out first, of course. They've been brought to John and Mary's flat."

Just then, John entered the room. "All packed up then?"

"Did you know about this?!" Sherlock demanded.

"Know about what? What are you two bickering about now?"

"I was just telling Sherlock that he'll be staying with you and Mary. He's taking it as I expected; like a child being told he has to finish his dinner before having dessert."

"Well, course you're staying with us," John said simply, thinking that was fairly obvious. "You've been in the hospital, Mate. You're not just going home alone."

"Yes, I am," Sherlock challenged, growing more annoyed by the second. "I have been rotting away in this stodgy rat hole for weeks. I'm recovered, I'm pissed off, and I'm perfectly free to make my own decisions. Good morning Mycroft, don't let any highly contagious patients hit you on the way out."

OOOOO

"This is ridiculous," Sherlock droned, stepping into John and Mary's flat. His bag hit the floor with a thud.

"Too bad," John replied. "We've put your things in the guest room. Skull included."

"Is Mary here?"

"Uh, no. She's at work. Will be until tonight." Sherlock gave a nod of acknowledgement. "Am I not good enough company for you?"

"No, you're fine. Just haven't talked to her in a few days," he responded, taking his bag to the guest room. "I figured you two finally had the big blow out, maybe thought you told her not to come see me."

"Who she sees and talks to is her business," John answered crossly. "And we didn't have the 'big blow out' you're talking about. Actually we did…the night you went back into the hospital after running away to Leinster Gardens. No, things have been pretty quiet."

"Silent, I'm sure," the detective quipped, rejoining John in the living room.

"You know, I don't get you." Sherlock rolled his eyes. "Mary shot you, _you_. And you're perfectly fine with it. You just want us to kiss and makeup. Forget anything ever happened."

"Please, John. You aren't angry with Mary because she shot me," Sherlock asserted, using his deep, all-knowing voice for effect. "You know why she shot me, she had no choice. She was protecting her child and her husband. People talk about protective mothers in the animal kingdom; trust me, human mothers, much more frightening. They can actually run through the consequences of their action beforehand, but do it anyway. That is true ferocity. No, you're angry with Mary because she lied to you. Because when you found out about her, for a moment, you felt like the woman you fell in love with didn't exist."

"You're understanding people a lot better these days," John sneered.

"I've been surrounded by nurses morning, noon, and night for the past two and a half months. It was a crash course in how to read emotional baggage."

"Still, why are you so okay with it?!" John begged, genuinely stumped at this. "She lied to you too."

"She didn't lie, she omitted the truth."

"Right, right… and you're not crazy, you're omitting sanity."

Sherlock smirked. "Everything about Mary was right in front of me and I missed it," he said and took a seat on the couch. "Mary did not lie to me."

John pursed his lips the way he did when he wanted to hit Sherlock, and breathed out through his nose. "Well, she lied to me."

OOOOO

"Mary," Sherlock called from the kitchen, staring confusedly between the two boxes he held in his hands. "One of these of these cake mixes contains nearly twice the amount of monocalcium phosphate, which one have you been eating?"

"I haven't been eating cake, Sherlock," Mary called back from her bathroom.

He set the cake mixes down and picked up two of the cans he had also extracted from the cabinets. "Have you been eating any canned corn or vegetables? They all have to go. Your pantry is a danger zone." He waited for her response, but heard none. "Mary?" He called again, and decided to head toward the bedroom-bathroom when there was still no answer. "Any levels of BPA in food can be harmful to a fetus, I recommend you immediately get rid of—" He stopped when he saw Mary. "What are you doing?"

She was standing sideways in the mirror, shirt lifted above her abdomen, with a small, sad smile on her lips. She turned to him a bit flustered. "Oh, hi Sherlock…" She rolled her shirt back down. "I was just…having a look."

"At what?" He was perplexed.

"At this," she shrugged with a smile, bringing both hands to her middle. Sherlock, at last, saw what she was going on about. She had a small baby bump. For the last few weeks she had been wearing loose-fitting clothing making it difficult for him to gauge her weight gain. But now he saw. "I guess things have been so strange around here I hadn't noticed how much the baby had grown." When she pulled the shirt tighter he could really see it.

He stared a moment longer and then brought his eyes back up to hers. "At three months the fetus is roughly the size of a kiwi. So most of that weight is you."

Mary shook her head with a smile. "Oh great, thanks."

"Anytime."

"So," she said with a ponderous look as she exited her bedroom and headed toward the living room. "How does a man who doesn't even know the Earth goes around the sun know so much about pregnancy all of a sudden?"

Sherlock groaned and followed her out. "That information is completely irrelevant to life on Earth. The sun will never turn up asking me to solve—"

"No seriously, I'm curious."

He thought a moment. "I recently had a case where a husband suspected his child was not his; I proved this theory correct by precisely mapping out the gestational—"

"Try again, Sherlock," Mary hindered, calling his fib.

Sherlock sighed, not even bothering to go ahead with a second lie. "You were napping earlier; I had nothing to do so I read one of those books by the mantle."

Mary knowingly glanced at the spot on the mantle he pointed to, touched at his investment. "The pregnancy books?"

"Well yes, of course the pregnancy books. Why does a doctor and nurse even have those books? Shouldn't you just know everything already?"

"John's an army doctor," Mary said. "He didn't exactly have to deal with many pregnancies on the front lines."

"And you?"

"Only been practicing five years, remember? Plus, when you're actually the one having the baby, you want to be thorough. More in-depth."

The remainder of the afternoon mainly consisted of Sherlock cleaning out the pantry and every cupboard in the flat of anything that could be harmful to the baby. Despite Mary's protests that she had been extremely careful and had not been eating anything she thought to be dangerous, Sherlock went on cleaning anyway until there was almost nothing left. When finished, he felt very satisfied while Mary was left exhausted and starving.

By the time John returned home from the clinic he found both of them on the couch with three takeaway containers cluttering the coffee table. Upon closer look, he saw that Mary had fallen asleep on Sherlock's rigid shoulder. He suppressed a smile and headed to the kitchen for something to snack on. "Well," he said, gazing into the barren fridge. "You've been busy then?" Sherlock didn't respond.

"Sherlock," John said shutting the door and coming over to his friend.

"Mary's sleeping," the detective, so awkwardly positioned, whispered.

"Yeah I can see that."

"Then shut up."

John rolled his eyes. "She's fine, you can't wake her up once she's on the nod."

Sherlock suspiciously eyed his friend and then, with the greatest caution and tact, lowered Mary from his shoulder down to a pillow on the couch. He waited a moment following the maneuver to be sure she didn't stir. She didn't. "Right then," he said, still speaking in a hushed tone. "How was your afternoon?"

"Tiring, irritating, full of sick people…the usual."

"Sorry to hear that."

"Yeah, well I was just going to grab something to snack on and I noticed my kitchen is nearly empty," John recapped to the person he imagined was responsible for the shortage. "What did you do?"

"Your kitchen was full of harmful products and chemicals. Perhaps not harmful for me or you, but for a baby this size of a walnut quite a different story."

John's mouth hung slightly agape under wrinkled brows. "You're serious? Sherlock, I'm a doctor. I know whether or not something is safe to eat. Why on Earth would I keep things in the house if I knew they could hurt my baby?"

"Same as always John. My eye is keener than yours. Don't be embarrassed, it's keener than everyone's." Sherlock straightened his jacket collar and made his way toward the coffee table to clear the boxes.

"You got a takeaway I see."

"Yes, Mary was craving Chinese food…and pizza. Chinese food on pizza actually." Sherlock stacked the containers and the empty pizza box on the countertop, and the savory aromas immediately enveloped John.

"God, that smells great," he hummed, reaching into the first box, but disappointment soon wiped the smile off his face. "These are all empty…"

"Yep."

"You ordered three," John tried, but then hung his head back and breathed calmingly. "Why on earth would I assume one was mine…" He hustled to the cupboard where he found nothing. Moved right on to the next one.

"Two were for Mary, one was for me. If you wanted us to order you one you should have said so." He watched his friend go from cabinet to cabinet, getting more frustrated each time. "Though there was no guaranteeing it'd be here by the time you got home. Your wife was not at all shy of finishing what I left of mine."

"Sherlock, you can't let her eat like that!" John uttered in a whispered yell so as not to wake the woman sleeping on the couch.

"I tried to stop her, she got angry with me," Sherlock defended, it was the truth anyhow.

"She's going to be sick tonight."

"She's always sick at night…and in the morning…and the occasional afternoon."

" _No_ , if you, Mr. King-of-Deductions-I-Notice-Everything, had been paying attention you would see that she hasn't been getting sick as often lately. That the morning sickness is finally winding down. Except when she eats like crap. Then she gets sick!" John placed both hands sternly on his hips and hung his head exhaustedly.

Sherlock stood quietly, seemingly just as annoyed with John. "What time is it?" he suddenly asked.

John narrowed his brows, but checked his watch anyway. "Just past four."

"Got to go." He vanished into the spare bedroom, hoping John wouldn't follow.

John did. "Where are you going?"

"Out."

"You can't go out."

"Have to. Have to meet someone."

A look of realization spread over John's face. "Oh, bloody no you don't. You are NOT going on a case."

"It's not a case, it's a meeting," Sherlock retorted, throwing his trench coat over his shoulders in an intentionally ostentatious manner. "I won't be long."

"Mycroft is going to—"

"Get his knickers in a twist, I know. C'este la vie. Besides, I'll be back before he's informed."

"Oh, I'm not going to inform him," John said. "He's your problem."

"I know _you_ won't, but the people he has watching your flat will."

"Pretty sure he just said that to scare you, Sherlock."

"Don't be ridiculous. He doesn't scare me. And he didn't say that." Sherlock grabbed a couple things off his dresser and quickly shoved them into his pockets. "The flat next door's been empty six months; suddenly someone's bothered to straighten 'welcome' mat in front of it. Who would do that? The person who's moved in, yet online the flat is still listed as vacant. There's a new hotdog stand across the street that gets two, maybe three customers a day. Probably because the hot dogs are rubbish or maybe because you live in the suburbs with virtually no foot traffic. Why wouldn't the stand, equipped with very convenient wheels, move to a busier location? Mrs. Bell in the unit over has hired a grounds keeping team, all of whom have rather obviously taken much more of an interest in looking after this flat than looking after her landscape. They all take shifts, and always wear the same clothes to work. Always. As if they were in costume."

"So what? You're being paranoid," John suggested. "No one is watching the flat."

"Mrs. Bell's husband divorced her last year for a younger woman and she had to declare bankruptcy in April. Do you really think she has the self-esteem or the funds available to her right now to care about how her lawn looks? The woman doesn't do her hair when she goes out, she would never bother hiring landscapers, especially not every hour of everyday. So, she's likely the one being paid to let them work. It's a win for her. She doesn't ask any questions and gets a nice check in the mail."

John was starting to (reluctantly) trust Sherlock's instinct. "Fine, that's weird, but what if it isn't Mycroft's men? What if they're people who want to hurt you instead? That does happen, you know?"

"They aren't."

"How do you know?"

"In order to test my theory, I've been making myself appear vulnerable to attack twice a day. When you and Mary are out, of course. Engaging in conversation with the neighbors about my weakened state, feigning sleep very close to open windows, the other day I sat outside for an hour well within range of any potential sniper posts. I've concluded I'm safe. These are Mycroft's men. Bye now." Before John could prevent him, Sherlock slipped out the door and was gone. The doctor grumbled inwardly and returned to the kitchen, desperate to find something edible.

That night, as John suspected, Mary ran to the bathroom at 3 a.m., violently emptying the contents of her stomach. From his post on the couch he could hear his wife's esophageal struggle coming from one bedroom door and Sherlock's obtrusive snores from the other. With a groan, he rose from his makeshift couch-bed and stumbled to the bathroom where he found Mary kneeling on the floor next to the toilet. After one final push from her digestive system, she wiped her mouth with a nearby hand towel and leaned back against the wall.

"You alright?" he asked. She nodded, but couldn't say a word. She just remained on the floor, arms protectively around her stomach. He leaned onto the door frame, tugging the sash of his robe a little tighter. "I can get you a glass of water if it'll help."

"Nothing helps," she rasped out.

"Maybe not eating two tubs of Chinese food on pizza would have," he pitched, not to be mean, just to lighten the mood.

"Craving."

He stared at her a moment, feeling awkward and unsure of what to say. "You think that was the last of it? Ready to go back to bed?"

She took a deep breath, contemplating how much nausea she felt tugging at her throat. "For the time being, I suppose."

"Good." John reached down and slowly pulled his wife to her feet, unexpectedly pleased she was drained enough to accept his help as they made their way back to her bed. "You really should keep—"

"Ah," Mary gasped, abruptly stopping her walk and grabbed her stomach.

John instantly turned to see her body curled over. "What happened, what's wrong?"

She seemed fine, but the panic in her eyes could not be missed. "I felt a…a cramp, a quick one," she stuttered, and straightened herself out as if to see whether the pain would return.

"Where did you feel it?" John asked urgently. "Was it a sharp pain like a knife or a dull jab…"

"It was here," she rubbed the spot where her hand was clutching. "And it was sharp, but not too painful. Just surprising."

"Okay," John breathed. "Well, get over on the bed. Come on…"

Mary did as he said and upon sitting down felt the stab again. This time she gasped louder "Ah, it happened again, same spot."

"Oh God," John whispered, terror settling into his own eyes. He began to feel sick himself. "Alright, get dressed. I'm taking you in."

"John, wait…it didn't hurt. I think it was just a cramp."

"I'm not taking the chance, Mary!" Mary recoiled back a bit. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to yell." He kneeled down next to her. "I've been worried something like this could happen because of the stress you've been under and the blood pressure thing; please just let me take you to the hospital."

"The hospital is fifteen minutes away, and they take forever to see emergencies…" Tears were beginning to form in her eyes, and the real reason for her hesitance came through. "What if we get there and it's too late?"

John swallowed to push away the lump he felt collecting in his throat. He had to think quickly. "Lie down."

"What?"

"Just do it, I'll examine you myself." He dug into the dresser drawers for the stethoscope and sphygmomanometer he kept in the house.

"Can you really be objective right now?

"I'll have to be."

Just then, Sherlock uncoordinatedly shuffled into the room. "You two are being impossibly loud in here, any chance you could—"

"Either shut up or get out!" John commanded, wrapping the sphygmomanometer around his wife's arm to take her blood pressure. Sherlock immediately recognized the gravity of the situation and kneeled down by Mary's side where his friend was. "Just relax, Mary," John said soothingly as he slid the stethoscope under the arm band.

"Can I help?" Sherlock asked quietly.

"Sit on the bed with her; try to be good at comforting someone for once."

John performed every test he deemed necessary along with some that probably weren't, Mary got through all of them relatively calm and without any further pains, and Sherlock learned, for the first time in his life, how to hold another person's hand without making them feel uneasy and trapped. However, thanks to the utter terror that hung in the air over the gravity of the situation, by the time John had finished examining his wife, none of them had any idea how much time has passed.

"So, I took your blood pressure, listened to the baby's heartbeat…" Mary and Sherlock listened intently as John listed some other medically relevant details from his examination, wiping some sweat off his tired eyes. "And I think what you felt before may have just been gas. You haven't felt any pain since the first two?" Mary shook her head no, hands protectively covering her tiny baby bump. "And there's no blood or uterine contractions, the baby's heartbeat wasn't elevated at any point, neither was your blood pressure." He breathed out heavily. "Looks like this was just a scare."

Sherlock gave Mary's arm a gentle, relieved squeeze to which she returned a small smile, though there was still a bit of residual nervousness from thoughts of what could have happened. "You're sure?" she asked John, instinctively.

"Yes," he replied without a second's hesitation. "The baby is fine." He collected the medical instruments he had brought out during the examination—rather, the instruments Nurse Holmes had been instructed to bring out during the examination—and put them back into the drawers and closet bins they had previously occupied. "Sherlock, hand me the ophthalmoscope."

Sherlock walked the tool over to the closet on the far side of the room where John stood with his hand out. But upon placing the device in the doctor's hand, he found his own was grabbed tightly instead. "John, you've got my hand."

John pulled him close and stared at him with what Sherlock later decided were the most serious eyes he had ever beheld. In a low and tenacious whisper, cautiously out of Mary's earshot, John said to him, "Don't ever let her have Chinese food on pizza ever again. I don't care if she has you at gunpoint again."

"It was just gas John, she's fine," the taller man rationalized, calling out the fallacy in John's fear.

"Sherlock, if anything like this happens again where I have even the tiniest, most unfounded reason to believe that I could lose my baby," he stopped and looked down to swallow what Sherlock guessed was some sort of emotional leak. "No Chinese food on pizza."

Sherlock nodded and looked back at Mary who was far too busy staring at the floor, caressing her small middle to notice them. "I won't."

"Alright." John finished putting the rest of his things away and gave his friend a genuinely appreciative pat on the back. "You can go back to bed now, sorry to have woken you."

Sherlock tiredly headed back to his room, looking back only once at John and Mary silently recuperating from the episode in the master bedroom. Mary still sat on the bed, John stood over her; neither looked ready to retire just yet.

"You should get to sleep," John said when the faint sound of Sherlock's door closing disrupted his mild trance.

"I know, I'll try. Won't be easy."

"Well, give it a go." He groaned slightly as he lowered his body into the armchair in the corner. "It's the best thing as far as helping you relax."

Mary eyed him curiously. "What are you doing?"

He gave a shrug and a quick turn of the wrists. "Nothing."

"You're sitting in the chair," she pointed and John actually looked at the chair upon which he was seated. "You're not going back to the couch then?"

"I'm just going to stay for a bit."

"But you said everything is fine…"

"Yes, everything is fine, but I'm going to stay for a bit," he repeated, drawing out those last three words. Mary opened her mouth to speak again, but John spoke first. "Just go to sleep. I'm just having a breather."

Mary eventually complied, getting back under her sheets. Reaching for the comforter, she looked over at him. "John—"

"You won't even know I'm here."

That was not what she was going to comment on, but she decided what she did want to say was better left unsaid at this point. Sadly, she lay down into the bed and tried to focus on what a gift it had been that nothing was wrong. Maybe it was because she had been so scared a short while ago and then so relieved afterward, maybe it was because the man she loved was sitting in a chair as far away from her as possible in order to keep an eye on her; it didn't really matter. Mary felt the first tear slide over the curve of her cheek bone and pool into the pillow. The first of many silent tears that night.


	4. Chapter 4

"You don't have to go, you know," Mary said sadly as she watched the detective pack up his things. Today was the day Sherlock was finally moving back into 221B Baker Street. She knew she couldn't complain. He had stayed long after he had originally planned to. Mrs. Hudson had already been back from holiday a week. He had no obligatory reason to stay.

"Need to start working again," Sherlock responded, tossing his skull between his hands before stuffing it into the open duffel bag. "The game is back on."

"Who you playing this time?"

"Lawyer in Cardiff can't find his yacht."

"A yacht?" Sherlock nodded affirmatively. "Are you taking John with you? He hasn't been on a case in ages?"

"He's been busy."

"He's been bored."

"Besides, wouldn't you rather have him here?" Sherlock turned to ask. "In case you need something."

Mary cocked her head to the side and continued to watch Sherlock gather his belongings from the spare bedroom. "Sherlock," she started, phrasing the question in her head. "This isn't some way of punishing John, is it? Not taking him on cases?"

He stopped packing and stared back the blonde woman. "John's been punished enough, don't you think?"

"I do," Mary agreed, guilt softening her inquisitive look. "That's why it's strange you won't take him on the case. He needs it now more than ever if you ask me."

Inwardly, Sherlock couldn't help but think that what the two of them needed now more than ever was each other. Perhaps he had naively concluded that leaving John at home with Mary while he was out solving puzzles would force his friend to finally confront the issues between them—issues, as Mary had told him during one of their many afternoons together, John had still not so much as mentioned.

"Sherlock," Mary went on, "I want John and I to move past this as much as you do, but you can't force John to do anything. And locking him up in the house with me might just make things worse."

Sherlock rolled his eyes and pulled out his phone. "Fine, I'll text him."

Mary pressed her lips together and gave a small nod. She bent down (which was getting a tad more challenging these days thanks to her significantly rounder tummy) to pick up one of Sherlock shirts and began folding. "I'm going to miss you being around; it was nice having someone to talk to about things."

"I'm not dying, I'm moving back to Baker Street, where I was before. Things are going back to normal."

"Maybe for you," Mary whispered. She saw that she got his attention and rubbed his arm reassuringly. "I know you have to go, Sherlock, don't mind me. I'm just being silly."

Sherlock lifted his closed lips into a small smile. He would miss spending time with her as well, but if he didn't start working again she wouldn't be safe, nor would John. Magnusson was still a huge part of the equation, and although getting things past John had been child's play lately, Mary was not so easily fooled. If he continued to investigate Magnusson under John and Mary's roof, she would undoubtedly find out. And that would be unfavorable.

That afternoon, Mary found herself lounged on her bed, bowl of ice cream in hand, weeping at the telly and hating every hormone in her body. As Rose let go of Jack and watched the frozen corpse sink into the Atlantic, littered with Titanic wreckage, Mary's whimpers turned to blubbers. Holding a tissue to her face with one hand and the remote in the other, she flicked off the movie. She should have known she wouldn't be able to handle this. Usually when she felt she was in need of some cathartic, sorrowful experience, Sherlock had talked her out of it, reminding her that while sad movies might quell any pent up emotions for a non-pregnant person, she was probably out of luck. But Sherlock wasn't here anymore.

"This is ridiculous," she sniveled to herself, wiping her eyes and setting down her ice cream. She wished she could be working so she wouldn't have to sit home so much with nothing but her emotions to keep her company. However, she and John had decided last month that cutting down her hours would be the easiest way to prevent her getting overworked. She was beginning to regret that decision, knowing she could have held out for another month or two.

Just then her phone buzzed. It was Sherlock. _John left jacket at home, check left pocket._

Mary got up off the bed and waltzed into the living room where she found the jacket in question draped over the couch. She reached into the pocket and found nothing. _Empty_ , she sent back.

 _Check right pocket._

Mary rolled her eyes at Sherlock's shortness, but slid her hand into the other pocket anyway. The only thing in it was his wallet. _Just his wallet_.

 _Thank you._ Mary wasn't sure how that exchange was relevant to the case they were investigating, but shrugged it off. After all, this was Sherlock Holmes.

Upon returning the wallet to its rightful place, something fell out of it. She leaned over and took the folded up piece of paper in her hands. "Oh my God," she murmured, a twinkle in her eye. It was her last sonogram. She didn't even know John had gotten a print. She smiled brightly down at her baby and brought a hand to her stomach, affectionately rubbing the growing bump.

It was one of the few moments of hope she had had in the last three months. That being the case, it made sense that the peaceful moment was abruptly shattered by the flat door swinging open and two arguing men barging in. "I'm sorry I forgot it!" John yelled at Sherlock who followed swiftly on his heels jabbering on about John's forgetfulness.

"We were sneaking into a naval base; you didn't think it'd be helpful to have some ID on you?"

"Well, _I_ didn't know we would be sneaking into a naval base, did I?" John scoffed. "You said we were looking for some sod's yacht!"

"Glad to see you two working together again," Mary quipped, standing by the couch. John stopped in his tracks, only now realizing his wife standing there.

"Hello, Mary. The wallet?" Sherlock said, getting right to the point.

"In his pocket." She handed the coat to the detective who came over to collect it. The two men turned to leave. "And this," she said, getting them to turn back around, "fell out of it."

John took the sonogram from her. He seemed visibly struck by the image, and the fact that Mary had found it. "Oh…alright."

"Good luck with the case," she weakly added, only trying to fill the awkward silence that had fallen between her and John.

John nodded and walked out of the flat without a word, making Mary's face fall. Sherlock gave her a comforting look before following after the army doctor.

The taxi ride back to the naval base was slow. Sherlock was rattling off everything he had deduced about the case so far starting with suspicions he had about the client to uncertainties he had with yacht to the connection both of these things had with the navy. John didn't hear a word of it. He was too busy staring down at the sonogram in his hand. He had been for the entirety of the trip.

Sherlock finally noticed the absent look on his friend's face and stopped talking to the air. "John, have you heard a word I've said?"

"Nope," John replied unapologetically, keeping his eyes on the picture.

Sherlock watched him a moment longer and then lost his patience in an exaggerated groan. "Well, it's not changing now is it…"

"What?" John pulled his stare away from the scan.

"The picture, it's the same as it was the last time you stared at it meaninglessly. Nothing's different. You aren't actually watching it grow."

John rolled his eyes and carefully folded the sonogram back up, stashing it away. "You wouldn't understand."

"No… how sad for me," Sherlock sarcastically snipped.

"Why are you getting so ticked off? We're on a case; you should be jumping up and down like a little kid on Christmas morning."

"No, _I'm_ on a case. You're somewhere else." Sherlock corrected. "My reason for bringing you was not so you could be utterly useless. If I wanted that I would have dragged along Gareth."

"Greg! His name is Greg!"

"Still being useless!"

John grumbled under his breath. "Alright, you know what, any time there is anything even just nearly bugging you, you throw a fit. The whole world stops because of whatever stupid thing is getting you miffed. Now I have actual, real, adult things weighing on me and I can't have just one moment of peace. One minute to look at one of the few things I have to be happy about these days."

"Well, it's your own fault." Sherlock snapped back.

"Excuse me?" John could have decked him.

"You could confront all these 'actual, real, adult things' anytime you want, but you don't. You haven't even tried to talk to Mary about the ordeal or her past. Not once. You keep her at arm's length and give her absolutely no clue as to what you're thinking with all of it. So, if you don't have many things to be happy about then it's because you're too busy sulking."

John's teeth clenched behind tight lips and he could feel his face redden. "You're an arse. You don't know anything about this stuff. You don't understand feelings and relationships, so don't you dare tell me I'm too busy sulking. I'll talk to my wife about this cluster fuck when I'm bloody ready, and you, you bloody egomaniac, don't get to decide that!"

Sherlock watched his friend slouch back into the cab seat, calming down a little more with every exhalation. "Fine. Are you ready to stop being useless?"

Back at home, Mary sorted through some scattered paint samples she had on the coffee table, for the nursery of course. Her phone buzzed. _I think we're making progress.—SH_

OOOOO

"Ughhh, shit!"

John was immediately awoken twenty minutes before his alarm was set to go off by a long, loud moan he heard come from Mary's bedroom. He froze on the couch, eyes fixed on the closed door, waiting for a follow up or at least some context.

"Ugh, no, no, no, please no…" She sounded upset and out of breath.

"Mary?" he called nervously, his voice still a little hoarse from sleeping. That's when he heard a loud thud shake the floor and flew up off the couch and toward the shut door. "Mary!" He flung the bedroom door open, startling his wife into the air.

"John, what are you doing?!" She grabbed her chest, obviously taken aback at his sudden entrance.

"I heard noises, you sounded like you were…I don't even know," he admitted, realizing he had jumped the gun as Mary didn't seem to be in any apparent peril. "Are you okay? I heard something heavy hit the floor."

"Yeah, I'm fine…" She rubbed at her temple and motioned toward the dresser. "The drawer fell out. I guess I pulled too hard."

John walked over to see the wooden drawer full of clothes on the floor in front of a now naked-looking dresser. "Jeez…how hard did you pull?" he rhetorically posed, scratching the back of his head. He looked back at her and closer now he could see a subtle shine in her eyes. "What's the matter?"

She blinked away the tears that had begun to tease her lashes. "What? Nothing…"

"Mary…"

She shook her head and discharged an exasperatedly defeated sound. "Nothing fits!" John finally took note of the floor which was covered in nearly every article of clothing she owned. "We have to be at the doctor's for 8:30 and absolutely nothing in this room fits me anymore. Every pair of pants hurts to wear. And after the appointment I'm working until six and my scrubs don't even fit anymore. They're too tight around the waist." She slumped onto the bed trying desperately one last time to get her jeans to button, but to no avail. "I was supposed to go shopping for maternity clothes yesterday with Mrs. Hudson, but she had to cancel. Something about muffins and her sister. I don't know."

John scanned the room. "Nothing fits?"

"Nothing!"

He wasn't proud to say it, but he hadn't realized how much her belly had rounded in her fourth month. "Alright well, what if you…I mean, maybe you could…" he groped for a solution, but came up with zilch. "Why don't you wear one of my shirts to the doctor's and then take the day off. Don't go into the clinic."

"No," Mary quickly responded not even thinking it over. "I am not taking another day off. I need to go out and do something. I hate being cooped up here as much as I am!"

"Well, you're having a baby, Mary. You can't be working all the time."

"You're having a baby too!" she countered. "And you work all the time. Whether it's at the clinic or on cases with Sherlock. I know you don't want to be here with me, I get that, but has it occurred to you that I don't want to be here with me all day either? And there are only so many visits with Mrs. Hudson and Molly I can take. I need to do something!" One last time, she pulled the fabric of the jeans together with every bit of forearm strength she could muster. And once last time she failed to make a connection.

John sighed and went to the living room to grab his phone. _Are you busy?_

Sherlock was sitting in his chair at Baker Street, fingers adjusted in a steeple as they so often were when he was mulling over a case. He looked down at John's text and then back straight ahead. _Yes_ , John received.

"No you're not, you baby," John mumbled to himself, sending a second text. _Nothing fits Mary. She needs new scrubs. Go to the shop on Oak and get her a few new sets._

Sherlock started to type 'No' when a client came in, a pensive look on her face and apprehension in her step. He stopped typing and put the phone down. "Hello," she said meekly.

John waited six minutes for a response from Sherlock who he assumed was with a client. He couldn't help but wish he was there too. Finally the vibration of the phone called his attention back. _I'll bring them to her appointment_ , he read.

'Thank God for boring clients,' John mused, and then headed back to the bedroom. "Mary, good news…"

OOOOO

"So Mary," Dr. Marshall said cheerfully, wheeling over the ultrasound machine. "How have you been feeling?"

"Fine," Mary replied, rolling up her— _John's_ —shirt when the doctor motioned for her to do so. "Tired, but other than that, fine."

"John, how's things on your end?"

"Uh, good." John nodded. "Very good."

Dr. Marshall smiled at the two of them, although she could see the couple didn't smile at each other as often as most of her patients did when they were about to see their baby on the screen. "Mary, you've done a great job keeping your blood pressure down. Although with a doctor for a husband I'd expect nothing less."

"Oh yes, John checks it religiously." Mary forced out a smile. These appointments were always particularly hard on her and John, because they knew how happy they _should_ be—seeing the baby was a reminder of that—but knowing that just made them realize how unhappy things had been since Mary's secret was revealed.

"Ready to see your baby?" They both nodded and Dr. Marshall squirted the cold blue gel onto Mary's stomach. "So there's the head," she pointed to the screen, although she guessed neither of them had any trouble recognizing it, "and there's the shoulders."

"Look at that," John murmured to himself in awe, but only Mary heard.

"Can we hear the heartbeat?" Mary asked, as if she needed more proof her baby was doing okay; the doctor complied with a smile. With one flick of a switch the soft lub-dubs filled the room and John and Mary faces finally broke into real, genuine smiles.

"Do you want to find out the sex today?"

"Oh, um…" They hadn't discussed that yet. "Should we…"

"Maybe wait?" Mary decided on her own.

John obligatorily nodded in agreement. "Yeah, we'll wait."

"Okay," Dr. Marshall granted, pretending not to notice the uncertain looks the husband and wife had just shared. "I can get you two a print of this, if you like."

"Yes," John eagerly blurted. "Please." He needed an updated one after all.

In the lobby, John and Mary held up the west wall, the former occasionally checking his watch and the latter picking at some chipping nail polish. Patients came and went, doctors and nurses hustled by, but the person they were waiting for was nowhere to be found. "Where is he?" Mary asked, getting up on her toes to see over the crowd of passer-by's.

"He said he'd meet us here with the new clothes after the appointment," John said, checking his watch once again. "I don't know what's keeping him."

Mary leaned back up against the wall and filled her cheeks with air only to blow it out exaggeratedly. "We both need to be at the clinic soon. If he doesn't turn up…"she trailed off. John looked down to see what had caught her attention. It was a newborn, being carted by them in a pram. He watched her eyes fixated on the child right up until the younger couple turned the corner out of sight.

"Mary, look," he summoned, getting her eyes to pull away from the place the baby was. "He's here."

"Here are the scrubs," Sherlock announced upon arrival, handing the shopping bag over to Mary.

She gratefully took the bag from him. "Thank you so much, Sherlock." She pulled one of them out with an impressed look. "Nice pattern, too."

"Molly picked it out," he nonchalantly reported, folding his hands behind his back. Mary excused herself to go change into the newly purchased garments. "Sorry I was a bit late. Got caught up."

"Doing what?" John then noticed a gash behind his friend's ear when Sherlock turned to look at a doctor hastening by. "Are you bleeding?!"

"Oh that?" Sherlock pointed a finger to the wound. "Just a scratch, no cause for concern. Listen, I've made some real progress on the yacht case. Cracked it, I think. Just need to test my theory. Shouldn't be too difficult, all I—"

"Why are you bleeding?"

"Why does it matter?"

John raised his eyebrows. "You're kidding, right?"

The taller man rolled his eyes. "I cut it myself. I needed to see into one of the boats at the marina and asking its owner for a handkerchief to stop the bleeding seemed like the easiest way to strike up a conversation."

"Naturally." John sarcasm had a bit of an extra punch today.

The detective studied his friend a moment. "Oh I see…"

"What?"

"The appointment didn't go well, did it?"

"Stop that." John hated when he deduced him. "It went fine. The baby's growing and Mary's blood pressure is in check."

"No, something else didn't go well. Something you feel silly even dismaying over."

"Knock it off," John warned, folding his arms over his chest. To his surprise, Sherlock did _not_ continue. He looked back at him, and the corners of his friend's mouth lifted into a smug smile. John's arms fell and he let out an annoyed lament. "Alright, have at it."

Sherlock obliged. "You started this morning in a relatively good mood, even with Mary being upset over her clothing dilemma. Normally, you grab something quick for breakfast like a granola bar or toast. Today you made yourself bacon, eggs, and cheese on a bagel. There are grease splatters from the bacon on your shirt just past your wrists, crumbs from the bagel that had fallen into your lap stuck to your trousers, and obviously you wouldn't just have bacon on a bagel so throw in the egg and cheese and make it a meal." Sherlock's eyes moved quickly to John's jacket which was slung over his arm. "You've brought your jacket with you, but you aren't wearing it. It's not exceptionally hot outside and you've already finished with the doctor so you aren't wearing it for one of two reasons. One: the shirt you have on is heavy enough that you don't need it, but then why bring it at all? So option two, the more likely choice: the shirt you picked out today is new, brand new. You are subconsciously trying to avoid covering it up with the old jacket. Then the obvious question, why put on a brand new shirt today of all days? Most people save new clothes for special occasions. You were going to see Mary's doctor and then going to the clinic. Both of which are common and mundane parts of your schedule. Easy, you had an unusual pep in your step this morning, wanted to put on something new to embellish the feeling. But what made you so cheery? What made this appointment so exciting for you?" Sherlock paused a second, naturally for dramatic effect. "Ah, today was the day you were expecting to find out the sex of the baby."

John stood silently and jutted his bottom jaw forward. "You know you could have just asked."

"Where's the fun in that? Besides, that's not all."

"No?"

"No. You clearly aren't so chipper anymore. So, you didn't find out, did you?"

"No we didn't, obviously," John huffed, putting his arms through his jacket and pulling it over his shoulders. He aggressively straightened out the collar before leaning back up against the wall as he had been prior to Sherlock's arrival.

"Mary's decision I assume, based on your current disposition."

"Yep." He looked at his shoes.

Just then, Mary returned to the guys in her new outfit. She looked much more comfortable now that her stomach actually had room inside of the shirt. "Perfect fit," she told Sherlock.

"Guessing your measurements was easy. We also accounted for another month or so of weight gain. Though at the rate you're going I can't guarantee the full month."

"Thanks," Mary replied sarcastically, looking down at her stomach. She turned to her husband who looked lost in thought. "Ready to go to work?"

He nodded once. "Yeah, I'll bring the car around. Sherlock, thanks for the delivery." And he left the lobby, en route to the car park.

"Guess you two had a nice chat, then," Mary said, running a hand over her baby bump, a bit self-conscious now.

"He's just disappointed you didn't find out the sex of the baby." Sherlock said, watching John exit the building. "He'll get over it."

Mary turned to him, surprised. "He told you we didn't?"

"No, I deduced."

"How?"

Sherlock decided against telling the truth on this one. "He referred to the baby as 'it,' if you knew the sex he'd have said 'her' or 'him.' Not 'it.'"

"Oh," Mary mouthed. "I didn't even know she was going to ask us today."

"Hm?"

"If we wanted to find out what were having. Caught me off guard."

"So why didn't you?"

"It's complicated." Mary stuffed both hands into her jacket pockets and shuffled a bit. She truly had wanted to know if she was having a boy or a girl. She could choose colors for the nursery, get a list of names together, and finally stop referring to her baby as 'it.' But that didn't seem right. Knowing the gender would make everything so real, and she wasn't sure she could be happy with her reality until things were right between her and John again. "I just wasn't ready."

Sherlock nodded and began to walk with Mary to the front entrance to wait for John. "You haven't told John about the other thing yet, have you?"

"What other thing?"

"Last time you talked to Mrs. Hudson, you said you hadn't felt the baby move yet. And you said you hadn't told John because it would worry him."

"Snooper," Mary chided.

"The walls are very thin; I can't help what I hear. Believe me…" He shuddered a bit. Mary grimaced at the implication.

"The doctor says the baby is doing fine." Mary shrugged. "I was a little worried about the movement myself, but it seems there's no reason to be."

"Well, if it does somehow come up, I wouldn't mention it to John _today_."

"Okay," Mary agreed with a questioning look. "Was he alright with it, I mean not finding out the sex?"

Sherlock looked to her, seeing guilt already filling her blue eyes, and nodded. "Just disappointed. That's all."


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Thank you all for the reviews, they mean the world to me and give me something awesome to look forward to** **J** **This chapter is a bit long, apologies! Hope you enjoy! I try to sprinkle in references to the original stories in every chapter (just like Moffat and Gatiss do.) Let me know if you've found any!**

OOOOO

"Mrs. Dessler?" Mary called into the waiting room, smiling when a middle-aged woman rose to her feet. "Come with me, please." The woman followed her to an examination room where Mary went through medical background, took down the reason for coming in, and briefly checked Mrs. Dessler's vitals. "Right then. My husb—erm, Dr. Watson will be in to see you soon." She pulled the door shut behind her and headed to John's office. "Chronic back pain in room 2," she reported, handing her husband the patient file.

"Alright, I'll head down in a minute," John replied professionally, taking it from her. Before she could turn to go, he stopped her. "Wait…I, uh, can't find the Mason family's file from last week. They're bringing the girls in for a follow-up today and I'd really like to have it. Would you mind looking for it while I'm in with," he checked the name on the file in his hand, "Dessler."

Mary cocked an eyebrow, a suspicious look coming over her. "You want me to stay here and look for a file?" John nodded. "Isn't that what Lara is here for?" she posed, speaking of the intern the clinic had taken on for the summer.

"Lara's shadowing Dr. Malcolm right now."

"No, she isn't. I just saw her, she walked right past—" Mary straightened herself. "Are you trying to keep me away from patients?"

"What? No."

"Yes you are," Mary accused, folding her arms over her stomach.

John gave up trying to fib. "Please just do it Mary, I have a good reason."

"The only risk there is for me being around sick patients is contracting an infection. I'm not taking any patients with infections so there's no reason to worry. Sue understands and is handling anybody that I shouldn't be around."

"There's a kid in the waiting room with chicken pox," John asserted. "You told me you'd never had chicken pox. I assume that's still true."

"It is," she stubbornly allowed.

"Well then I'm not taking any chances. Getting an infection while you're pregnant can cause—"

"I know what it can cause!" She stopped him right there, much to his relief.

John sighed and his stern expression softened. "I'm not trying to get in your way or make life harder."

"Huh, really," she scoffed, looking down and away. "Fine, I'll stay in here a bit."

"Thank you." John picked his pen up from his desk and headed to room 2 where his patient was waiting for him. Oddly enough, despite the ongoing tension and the mostly silent household situation, their working relationship was going rather smoothly—all things considered. They went to the clinic, saw sick people, swapped files all day, and then left. It was one of the few places being around each other didn't feel so painfully awkward.

"So, that was your wife before?" Mrs. Dessler asked John while he pressed a cold stethoscope to her back once more.

"Uh, yes, how did you know?"John replied, not stopping his work.

The older woman smiled contently. "When she left she said her husband would be in to see me shortly. That's you." John was taken just slightly aback. She hadn't called him her husband in quite a while, at least not to him. Although, he supposed he couldn't blame her. He wasn't proud to admit it, but he hadn't been much of a husband. And, to be fair, he wasn't using the term 'wife' too much either. "How far along is she?"

John meagerly smiled at the woman's warmth. "Sixteen weeks."

"Your first?"

He chuckled lightly. "How could you tell?"

"A guess," Mrs. Dessler said. "Congratulations."

"Thank you." John stayed mostly quiet for the remainder of the examination, even though his patient had plenty to say on all topics related to child rearing. He prescribed Mrs. Dessler with a muscle relaxer to help with the back pain and several exercises to further alleviate any discomfort. He was on his way back to his office when Lara stopped him in the hallway.

"Oh, excuse me Dr. Watson…" the twenty-one year old greeted him.

"Yeah?"

"The chicken pox kid is being seen by Dr. O'Connor now. I know you wanted updates on that."

"Yes, I do, thank you. Just let me know when he and his family are out of here." Feeling relieved to know Mary could soon return to where she wanted to be, he walked a little faster to his office at the end of the hallway. "Mary, I just talked to—" He halted when he saw his wife sound asleep at his desk. She had found the file he'd requested, and from the looks of it decided to use it as a pillow until he returned. Being that she was now entering her second trimester, he expected her to be more tired than usual, but didn't expect her to knock out at work. "Mary," he said softly, gently shaking her shoulder.

Her eyes slowly opened and it took her just half a second to realize what had happened. "Oh God… I was only supposed to close my eyes for a minute."

"If you're tired, go home and sleep," John tried, hoping her exhaustion would be enough to persuade.

"No, no, I want to be _here_ ," she lifted herself off the chair quickly and was immediately hit by a wave of dizziness that sent her back down holding her head. John reacted quickly enough that he could stop her from hitting the desk chair too hard.

"Oi, what happened?"

"Just a little dizzy, that's all. Stood up too fast."

"Did you eat lunch today?"

"No, I didn't get a chance. Sherlock needed my help with something this morning; I didn't have time to pack anything."

"Sherlock needs to be more independent," John grumbled protectively.

"John."

"I know, I know." He shook his head free of that minor issue and returned his attention to Mary. "But really, you need to go home. Eat something here and then take the rest of the day."

"No, I've only been here since ten this morning, my shift ends in an hour, I'm not stopping now."

"You're exhausted."

"Because I'm pregnant," Mary said, stating the obvious. "It comes with the territory."

"You don't need to be here," John persisted. "We have plenty of nurses here and on call. And it's been slow today anyway."

"John, don't baby me!" Mary snapped, making John's eyes widen in surprise. "It's so hypocritical! And I'm pregnant, I'm not an invalid. I'm not leaving until my shift is over and that's the end of it." And with that, she stormed off. John hung his head back and slumped into his chair. He should have known, sooner or later, she was going to call him out on the hypocrisy of his concern. Of course, it didn't feel like hypocrisy to him. To John, it seemed perfectly justified to be incredibly angry and bitter toward his wife while also worrying about her more than anything and wanting her to be okay. Although, that was just to John.

OOOOO

"Oh hello John," Mrs. Hudson said sweetly as she passed him on the Baker Street stairs. She was coming down, he was going up. "Did you just get here?"

"Yeah, thought I'd come by and see Sherlock."

"Oh, well," she lowered her voice to a hushed tone, "I wouldn't go up there now. He's in one of his moods."

"I'll take my chances," John replied with a smile. "Living with a pregnant woman has given me a lot of practice in dealing with moods."

"How is Mary? Nearly five and a half months along now, isn't she?"

"About that, yeah."

"You two work it out yet?" the older woman bluntly, but innocently, inquired with nothing but the most genuine concern contorting her brows.

"Uh, no. Not really."

Mrs. Hudson's expression somehow became even more full of pity. "That's a shame; I hope it gets cleared up soon." John nodded uncomfortably. "It'll be better that way."

"I think I'll just go on up then," John deflected, uselessly pointing to the door atop the flight of stairs. Mrs. Hudson made no effort to stop him and instead flitted away humming something about stubbornness. "Sherlock?" he called, letting himself into the flat.

"What do you want John, I'm very busy." It took John a second or two to see where that voice came from before noticing the detective lying flat on the floor by the kitchen with his eyes fixed ferociously on the ceiling.

"You look it," John quipped, taking a seat on top of Sherlock's cluttered desk.

Sherlock breathed in sharply through his nose and closed his eyes. "I'm working on a case for two very important clients. Can't afford any distractions."

"Important clients?" John repeated, puzzled. "Since when do you regard any client as important?"

Sherlock glanced at him, feigning offense. "I'm insulted. Of course my clients are important to me."

"They're mysteries are important to you, they are not," John responded dully. "They might as well be unsolved Rubik's Cubes that you play with once and then toss when they're finished."

"Is that not what it means to be important to someone?" Sherlock questioned.

"Not for normal people."

"Oh. Well then you're quite right." He sprung from the floor and strolled into the kitchen to grab what John saw to be a letter, already stamped and sealed. "Pen," he monosyllabically requested.

John tossed him one from the desk. "So, what's the case?"

"Possible blackmail."

John made his way toward the kitchen. "And who's the client?"

Sherlock looked up at John, contemplating whether or not he should answer. He decided there was no harm. "Two highly-ranked people of great and indirect importance to the British government. I can't give names though. I told Mycroft I wouldn't, in return he's agreed to pull some members of the team he's had watching me."

"You've taken a case for your brother?" John was a little more than surprised.

"I'm thinking I can get him to agree to pull the lot of them if I actually do keep the names hush hush." He scribbled something John couldn't read on the front of the envelope and then dispensed the letter into his breast pocket.

"Fancy a trip to the post office?"

"What are we doing here?" John asked, shuffling into the post office behind Sherlock who was quickly making his way toward the counter at the very back.

"How do you catch a blackmailer?"

John hated when Sherlock answered questions with more questions. Show-off. "I'd love to know."

"Threaten the security of the thing they need most," Sherlock replied, still two paces ahead of John.

"Meaning?"

Sherlock finally reached the desk in question and smiled at the young woman behind it. "Hello Kate, do you remember your instructions?"

Kate grinned in a way that seemed to be meant more for security cameras than for Sherlock's eyes. "Yes, will that be all Mr. Holmes?" she said as she took the letter, still using a professional and uninterested voice to mask something slightly more deliberate in her eyes.

"It will." And with that, he turned on his heel and started for the door the two men had just come in. "More than anything," Sherlock began to quietly explain to John, "a blackmailer needs to know their information will be useful. But, they have a very fine line to walk. Two things can sabotage blackmail. The first being the victim deciding that keeping whatever incriminating thing the blackmailer is holding over their head secret is not worth the pain of being controlled by another person. And the second is that the person being blackmailed has run out of money to give and thus has nothing left to offer and even less to lose."

John followed along attentively as the two men pushed through the doors and back into the midday breeze. "Which would also push them more toward the first scenario."

"Exactly. So, how do you catch a blackmailer?" Sherlock posed to John again, who just shrugged and offered no answer. "You start blackmailing their victim too. Taxi!"

John stared bewildered at his friend who, with his arm in the air hailing a cab, clearly did not think anything of what he had just divulged. "So that letter…that was you blackmailing someone?!"

"Keep your voice down, I'm not trying to go to prison."

"Sherlock, you are going to blackmail a higher-up in the British government! That's insane. You are insane."

The taxi pulled up to the curb and both hopped in. "I have a time table for the case, a deadline. This is the fastest way to smoke out the blackmailer. If the victims start being blackmailed by two parties they will run out of money faster and be more desperate to come clean with whatever secret is holding them hostage. That's bad news for the real blackmailer."

"And what if you get caught?"

"I've ensured that won't happen," Sherlock said coolly, staring out the window.

"How?"

"Kate…she's a member of my homeless network. I pulled some strings and got her a job at the post office last week. A few years back, I prevented the manager's father from being arrested on Christmas Day. He owed me. In return for the job, Kate is doing me one final favor and disguising the letter." He was indubitably proud of his precision. "Some essence of every person who comes into the post office with something to mail will be absorbed into that envelope. It will be virtually untraceable by the time it gets to its intended recipient. Kate is making sure of it. I also used four different types of handwriting on the front. One that is clearly male, one undoubtedly female, one specific to Dutch shoemakers over the age of 70, and one meant to look like a novice forgery."

John just stared with a small, scolding smile at his lips. "This is stupid."

"Nope, it's brilliant." When they reached Baker Street, Sherlock evacuated the cab and quickly headed to the door. Leaving an irritated John to pay, as usual.

"Sherlock," John called, after shuffling out of the taxi and trying to catch up with his friend who was bounding up the stairs to his flat. "What happened to you not taking any dangerous cases for a while?"

"It's not dangerous, it's fun!"

John shook his head and pulled off his coat heading to the kitchen for some tea. He tried four cabinets and found them all empty. "Where's the tea?"

"Out."

"Course." He huffed and made his way to exit the flat.

"Where are you going?"

"To get some from Mrs. Hudson," John answered, jogging down the stairs. "Mrs. Hudson," he alerted as he pushed open the door to her flat. "Do you have any—" He got quite a surprise when he entered. Mary was sitting at the table with Mrs. Hudson; both women looked up, just as surprised. "Oh, hi…I didn't know you were here."

Mrs. Hudson shifted her eyes back and forth between the estranged couple and finally broke the silence. "Well, there's no point in the three us just staring at each other not saying anything is there?" she blatantly commented, rising from the table. "John, would you like a biscuit?" She reached for the tray that sat between her and Mary, with noticeably fewer biscuits on Mary's side.

John held up his hand and shook his head 'no;' Mrs. Hudson sadly set the tray back down. "No thank you. I just came down for some tea. Sherlock's out."

"In the cabinet by the fridge, just like always. But you'll have to make it down here. Sherlock broke his fancy induction kettle last week when he tried cooking a hand on it. Wanted to test something for a case I 'spose."

"A hand?" Mary incredulously repeated. "Where did he get a hand?"

"Molly, I think," Mrs. Hudson answered, sitting back down at the table. "She had an extra one in the morgue."

"Sounds like him," John said, and went to work on his tea, fully prepared to pretend like he wasn't even there.

"So, now where were we?" Mrs. Hudson sympathetically turned her attention back to Mary, realizing this was awkward for the couple. "How did your last appointment go?"

John couldn't help but listen to his wife recount the details of their last trip to the doctors. After all, he couldn't just turn his ears off. Mary kept it straight-forward and unemotional, logistics mainly. John wondered how she might have spoken about it if he weren't standing five feet away. Would she tell Mrs. Hudson the reason she chose not to find out the sex of the baby? Hell, John wondered, would she tell him the reason? Probably not. Maybe if he asked…

Mrs. Hudson's voice pulled him away from his private thoughts and back into the room. "Have you felt the baby kick yet?" the older woman nearly squealed, excitedly bringing praying hands to her chin.

Mary uncertainly looked down into her tea cup and then subtly at John's back. "Um, no…not yet." John's ears perked and his eyes immediately shot up, but he didn't dare turn around.

"What?" Mrs. Hudson's breathy surprise induced a reiterative head shake from Mary. "No movement at all?"

"No." John, mouth still slightly agape at the news that had come as a shock to him, could hear the anxious despair, subtle as it was, masked behind the 'oh well' tone in her voice.

"Well, I'm sure you will. Soon too." Mrs. Hudson leaned back with a comforting smile and a thoughtful chuckle. "After all, with you two for parents I'm sure that baby will be restless as anything."

John turned around to sneak a glance, but Mary caught his eyes before they could dart away. They exchanged pensive looks, much to the landlady's oblivion, and then returned their eyes to their respective tea mugs. "I think I should start heading home," Mary delicately injected into the quiet of the kitchen, standing up from the table. "It's getting late and we," she gave her stomach a loving rub, "haven't eaten dinner yet."

"Oh, of course dear," the older lady concurred, rising from the table as well. "Take some of these biscuits with you. I don't care for them and Sherlock doesn't eat much when he's on a case. John, will you be going home with Mary?"

John turned around grasping an empty mug in his hands; clearly he had still not had his tea. "Oh, I uh…"

"You're helping Sherlock with the case, aren't you?" Mary provided, as her husband seemed at a loss for words.

"No, he isn't," a voice previously not a part of the conversation chimed in. Sherlock whisked into the kitchen, grabbing the tea cup from John and pouring some for himself.

"You solve it in the last three minutes?" John queried, narrowing his eyes at the man sipping the tea he just made.

"Nope, but I don't need you right now." Sherlock sat back on the counter behind him. "Go home with your wife."

Mary was ready with a dismissal. "Sherlock, you don't have to—"

"Nonsense, Mary," the detective cajoled. "John will be more useful at your flat than mine."

"Useful?" John's hands went to his hips, mildly offended.

"John," Mrs. Hudson said, putting a delicate hand on his arm. "Go home with Mary."

It was obvious John and Mary were going to be cornered no matter what, and they knew this. Sherlock and Mrs. Hudson were equally dedicated in their efforts to get the estranged spouses back together or at least on speaking terms, and this was not the first time they had ganged up on them. "It's because they care, that's all. They aren't trying to be difficult," Mary said to John who stood closer to the street waving for a taxi.

"I know." A cab driver saw the hand in the air and pulled over for the couple. No words were spoken on the ride back to their flat, even though Mary was positive John had something to say about the information she had divulged to Mrs. Hudson. Just as the last months had been, she now got to endure a waiting game. Just standing by until John let whatever was on his mind surface.

By the time they got home it was dark out, and even darker inside their flat. Mary flicked on a lamp and shrugged off her jacket on the way in. John followed close behind, but when Mary veered off to the bedroom, John proceeded to the couch. He all but collapsed into it and tried his best to relax his muscles as the cushions beneath him deflated under the weight of his body. His fingers rubbed at the headache forming in between his eyes until he heard a loud gasp from Mary cut through the flat.

"Oh my God! John!" she yelled, sounding quite frantic.

The terror immediately transferred and John jumped off of the couch and dashed to her. When he got to the bedroom he found Mary by the window with a hand covering her mouth and fear pooling in her eyes. "What's going on?" Before she could respond, he saw the answer staring him in the face.

"Jesus," he breathed, eyes taking in the shattered bedroom window. There was glass all over the place.

"The lock's broken too," Mary added, pointing to a now mangled lock.

"Stay here, don't move," John commanded, pushing her against the wall. He went to his desk drawer and took out his gun. Cocking it, he first checked the bedroom for any unwelcome guests. There were only a handful of places a person could hide—the wardrobe, under the bed, in the adjoining bathroom, and behind the door. After the brief sweep, he moved through the entire flat twice checking every possible place an intruder could be, until he was absolutely certain it was clear. He came back to Mary who, much to his surprise, had listened to him and not moved. "There's no one here," he assured her, setting down his gun.

"You're sure?" she audited, not even realizing her hands were protectively over her bump.

John nodded affirmatively. "I'm sure. And it doesn't look like anything's been messed with."

"Why would someone break in?" she wondered out loud, although there was a frightening answer in the back of her mind that she knew was as good an explanation as any.

"I don't know, is there anything in here someone would want to take?"

Mary shook her head at first, and then her eyes grew wide. "The flash drive, John. The one I gave you. Where do you keep it?"

That flash drive had not even been mentioned since the night she put it down in front of John and Sherlock for the first time. The utterance of it stabbed John just a bit, but for the sake of the situation he got over it. He reached deep into his breast pocket and pulled out the small drive, the letters A.G.R.A. staring both of them in the face. "I have it."

Mary breathed a slow sigh of relief and John replaced the memory stick back into his pocket. "I'll look around to see if anything was taken…"

"I'll get this cleaned up," John replied, motioning to the broken glass at their feet.

When Mary finally returned to the bedroom after going through the whole flat and finding nothing missing or out of place, John had the glass taken care of and was almost done boarding up the window. "Where did you find that?" Mary asked, pointing to the slab of wood he was nailing to the window frame; this seemed like a better reaction than her first internal one which was 'why are you ruining our window frame?'

"I took a shelf out of the kitchen cupboard. It's only temporary. I'll get another window in here tomorrow." He hammered in the last nail and stepped back to assess the work. "There, that ought to hold."

Mary nodded and looked down at her belly. "I'm sorry, John…"

"For what?"

"For this," she remarked obviously. "Clearly someone came in here looking for m—"

"Stop," John firmly interrupted. "We don't know why someone broke in here and didn't touch anything. They could have been after you or they could have been after me. I traipse around with the world's most ostentatious detective and am probably on a lot of people's shit list because of it. So we don't know. So we aren't going to go there."

"Alright." Mary sat down on the bed, shifting a bit to accommodate her growing abdomen. "I ordered us a takeaway. Chinese. It should be here in about fifteen minutes."

John nodded and tossed his hammer down on the floor by the window. "Thanks."

They ate together at the kitchen counter, just like Sherlock and Mrs. Hudson had wanted, but no words were shared. Little did they know they were both working out the same conclusion in their heads about the broken window.

'Nothing was touched,' Mary mused, twirling a noodle around her fork.

'Nothing taken,' John thought across the island, stabbing a piece of orange chicken.

'The window was shattered _and_ the lock was broken,' Mary mulled. 'Why smash the window if the lock was broken?'

'Why break both?' John reflected. 'If the lock's taken care of, no need to break the window. If the window's smashed no need to break the lock.'

'Were there footprints in the carpet? I can't remember.' Mary scooped up some fried rice.

'There weren't any footprints in the carpet, just broken glass.' John dipped another piece of chicken into the sauce pooling on his plate.

'John's gun was still here, they didn't take it.' Mary's chews slowed at the thought. 'What if he had been home?'

'We weren't home…that was obvious.' John's eyes squinted at nothing, but soon widened and he kicked himself for not realizing this before.

'The flat was in complete darkness, why—" It hit her all at once.

"John." "Mary." They both said at the same time, each feeling they had reached a logical explanation.

"You go first," John offered.

"I think the window was a message, a threat."

"They didn't come inside," John added, agreeing with her statement. "And they wanted to make it clear this wasn't a burglary."

"It's a scare tactic; show someone that you're after them."

"Shit."

The thrill of figuring out what had happened and being on the same page for the first time in a long time lasted all of two seconds when the danger of the realization set in and they both saw that they now had many more questions than answers. Questions they couldn't answer. The silence returned.

They spent remainder or the night in the living room, feeling much more comfortable knowing where the other was. Mary was thumbing through a child birthing book that Janine had given her and John was drafting a new blog post. Occasionally, Mary would look up and watch John sort through some notes he had made about the cases, and when she resumed her reading John would gaze at her as she wrinkled her nose at some of the cold hard facts of giving birth. Sometimes he would see her hand rub her stomach and he wondered if she was feeling anything, although he knew she probably wasn't. Around 10 p.m. her yawns became more frequent, making John's eyes droop just a little more as well.

She tucked the book under the coffee table where the other pregnancy books and magazines were and pushed herself up out of the chair. John looked up at her light moan. "Going to bed?"

"Mmhm." Mary grabbed the empty bowl which had previously been filled with a trail mix of sweets and after dumping it in the kitchen, headed to her room.

John stayed where he was, but did not go back to blogging. He stared down his keyboard, as if trying to coax his fingers into typing, but seconds later looked back up at the bedroom door. His eyes shifted to the living room window and then to the locked front door and then back to the computer. Pouting his lips the way he always did when in contemplation, his knuckles tapped against the laptop. Finally he sighed against himself and closed his computer, walking in a beeline to the bedroom.

Mary was pulling her comforter up over her legs when he entered the room. She glanced up at the man who now looked as if he had suddenly forgotten his reason for coming in. "Hi John," she said, an insinuation of confusion behind the greeting.

"Hi," he returned, still in the doorway. He took another step into the room and planted his feet more firmly. "I'm, uh, going to stay in here tonight."

"What? No, that's not necessary."

"That slab of wood may be nailed in, but that doesn't exactly make it a safe replacement for a locked window. Someone could kick it off or cut through it or something. After what happened tonight, I'm staying in here."

"The whole night?" Mary was in slight disbelief.

"Yes," John nodded with absolute certainty. "I'll stay up tonight and keep watch and take the day off tomorrow. Where's the armchair that was in here?"

"John, you can't stay up all night. It's silly. If someone tries to break through the wood you'll hear it."

"That doesn't mean I'd get here in time." Mary tried to protest again, but John spoke first. "I've already made up my mind. And you know how useless it is to try and change it now."

Mary stared back at him. If she didn't have their baby growing inside her, she probably would have been offended that John didn't think she was capable of defending herself against an attack. However, it was no surprise to see John's protective fatherly instincts kicking in, so she indulged him. And she definitely wouldn't mind him being here.

"So, where's the chair?" he asked a second time.

"It's not here anymore. Inspector Lestrade has it."

"What? When?"

"He separated from his wife again and his new apartment doesn't have any furniture. He mentioned it to Sherlock one day when I was around. I offered him the chair since we don't use it."

"Please don't say you were at a crime scene with Sherlock."

"I wasn't, Sherlock went with me to shop for maternity clothes one day and got a call from Lestrade during the outing."

John raised unbelieving brows at the image of Sherlock Holmes shopping, for maternity clothes no less! But, he decided to put that on the back burner for the moment, making a mental note to mock him for it later. "So, we don't have the chair anymore?" Mary nodded. "That's fine, floor works," John decided.

"John," Mary stopped him before he could sit down on the floor. "Why don't you just come on the bed?" He looked at her with obvious incredulity. "Just to sit. I'll be way over here, you can take the side closer to the window. It doesn't mean anything, but you'll be more comfortable and this way if anything does happen you won't be so close to the window that you're within range of flying wood or…something."

John thought for a long time about the proposition. He had stopped sleeping with his wife quite some time ago. In fact, they had only shared a bed as husband and wife for about a month before everything went to hell in a hand basket.

Mary saw he still needed some convincing. "We don't have to talk or anything. And you can keep your gun on the nightstand…"

After further consideration, John finally agreed. "Alright."

Mary gave a light smile and watched him retrieve his gun from the place he had stored it a few hours ago. She made sure to give him enough space as he lifted his legs onto the bed, leaning his back against the headboard. When he seemed content, she lowered herself down under the blankets. Internally, she debated whether or not to say goodnight. It was such a simple, normal phrase…but not between them. She ultimately decided not to say anything. John was sitting up on the bed she had lay alone in for the past five months for the sake of the baby, not because he was ready to share the bed again. She had to remind herself of that.

Thankfully, exhaustion crept upon her rather quickly and after ten minutes of lying quietly in the dark, she felt sleep finally taking over. To her surprise though, it was almost instantly disturbed by John saying something that sounded like it was directed to her.

"What did you say?" she groggily responded, rolling over to face his silhouette.

"Why didn't you tell me?" he repeated for her.

"Tell you what?"

"That you hadn't felt the baby move yet?" He sounded more hurt than mad.

She propped her head up on her elbow and an unfortunate expression crossed her face. "I didn't think you would want to know."

"Of course I want to know," John whispered. "Are you…worried that you haven't?"

She desperately wished she could see his face though the darkness to get a read on whether he was mad or sad or something else, but she couldn't. "I, um…I didn't want to say anything about it…Maybe I have been a little worried. The doctor said everything is going well though, and I'm sure she knows better than I do."

John nodded, not wanting to admit that learning that made him a little nervous as well. "Most women, in their first pregnancy, don't feel the baby move until they're between sixteen and twenty-five weeks."

"I'm already twenty weeks," Mary uselessly replied, playing with the tips of her fingers.

"Then it'll probably happen soon," he realized the mistake that may have been to say. "Or not. It could be later."

"Okay…"

"Just, try not to stress about it."

She stared up at his outline and bit the corner of her lip. "Do you…want to know? I mean when it does happen."

John took a deep breath in that was just barely audible. "Yes."


	6. Chapter 6

"Hold still," Mary instructed Sherlock for the third time, clearly becoming annoyed. It was as if she were trying to splint a squirmy child.

"I could if you would stop hurting it!" Sherlock sulked, gasping again when Mary pulled one of the bandages a little too tight.

"It's just a sprained finger, stop being a baby." The door to the examination room was left open and nurses passing by couldn't help but giggle at the sight of Sherlock Holmes needing a finger splint. "How did this happen anyway? You weren't doing something you told us you would take a break from, were you?"

"No, I…fell."

"You fell?"

"From a ladder."

"And the truth is…?"

"Classified."

"Right." She put the final clip in to hold the bandage and the splint together and then took a long-awaited seat in the chair next to the examination table, leaning her elbow against it. She blew out an exhausted breath as she rested her head in her propped up hand. "You're all set. Don't fiddle with it and don't get it wet, it'll smell."

Sherlock examined the splint for a moment or two before giving it a nod of approval. "Very good." Mary gave an appreciative nod watching him hop off the table. He automatically reclaimed his blazer from the chair on the far wall and looked back to his nurse as he pulled it back on. "I see the pregnancy is taking its toll on you."

"What?"

"You're exhausted. You were barely standing up for more than five minutes," he calculated, adjusting his lapels.

"Ten minutes, Sherlock," Mary corrected.

"You've only gained one pound, two at the very most, since I last saw you…"

"Nice of you to notice," she replied sarcastically.

"And your stomach is not nearly large enough to be tiring you out this much yet," he paused in his deduction, looking more closely at her eyes. "So you haven't been sleeping well lately."

Mary pushed herself up off the chair and took a stern step toward her friend. "Sherlock, being pregnant has a way of making you exhausted. Even when you get a full night sleep and eat more than enough and sit down when you need to. There's no puzzle here; my body is tired and it doesn't matter what I do. I'm always exhausted."

"Mmm…" He wasn't so keen to believe it. "You're more tired than usual." She rolled her eyes and began to clean up some of the supplies she had been working with. "You're twenty-one weeks pregnant, according to the baby books flooding yours and John's living room you should know how to manage fatigue brought on by pregnancy at this point. So there's something else."

"There's nothing else," she insisted, not looking up from her task.

"Balance of probability suggests otherwise." He took a step closer to Mary, startling her when she turned around and nearly hit her face on his chest. "John's snoring been keeping you up?"

"What? No," she lied, throwing her rubber gloves into the waste basket. "I can't even hear it from the bedroom."

Sherlock nonchalantly straightened the button on his jacket. "No, but you can hear it when he's sleeping next to you."

She looked up at him immediately, looking busted. It only lasted a second before she continued on with what she was doing. "We haven't made up if that's what you're thinking."

"It's not what I was thinking."

"Did he tell you that he's been staying in the bedroom?"

"He told me about the window. The rest was a walk in the park," he responded smugly, gearing up for his reveal. "Someone breaks into your flat, takes nothing. The obvious conclusion is they meant to send you two a message expressing that you've somehow made an enemy out of he or she or them. 'Them' is the safest bet, someone always needs to play lookout. Knowing John, he's concerned for your safety so he wants to stand watch at night, but not in the living room, that's too far away. So, it's an easy deduction, he spends his nights in the bedroom."

"Yes, for the last week and a half," Mary confirmed, leaning back against the examination table with folded arms.

"And even though he's supposed to be up all night ready to pounce like he intended, he's been falling asleep in the bed. I could tell when he stopped complaining of neck and back aches 24/7—can be quite a whiner that one. However, while he's sleeping like a baby, you're actually growing one. That means you've likely been waking up during the night uncomfortable and struggling to fall back asleep, especially with John's boisterous snoring. If you were simply tired from the pregnancy and not a lack of sleep you wouldn't be trying to cover up the bags under your eyes with extra concealer and mascara."

Mary just stared at him, not looking at all impressed. "You'd think that somewhere in all that observation you would see that I'm not exactly in the mood to be analyzed or reminded of how tired I look." Her arms fell to her sides and she moseyed over to the doorway. "Don't get into anymore fights with criminals. I don't want to get in trouble for bandaging you up. Makes me an enabler."

"I'll try," he conceded, walking with Mary into the corridor. "Is John here?"

"I think so; he was supposed to come in around 11. I'm heading down to his office now for a blood pressure check; you can come with me."

"That's alright. I'll text him later. It's not pressing." He turned to leave, but was held up.

"No, come. Please."

Sherlock faced Mary and gave a questioning look. "Why?"

She let go of a heavy sigh. "We may be sharing a bed, but that doesn't mean any other progress has been made. He never says a word to me unless it has something to do with safety or the baby's health. It'd be nice if you could talk to him while he does my pressure so I don't have to just sit there in silence."

The detective shrugged; it was no loss or gain for him. "Alright."

"Thank you." Sherlock began to make his way back down the corridor to John's office, but Mary's hand caught his before he could get too far. "Sherlock…"

"Yes?"

"Really, thank you." She wrapped him into a tight hug—well, as tight as her belly would allow. Sherlock didn't know what to do; thus far in the pregnancy, Mary had not been given to emotional outbursts so he had not had much experience in determining how to entertain them. The result ended up being something of an awkward one-armed half-hug complete with a few light pats on the back. She released him with a chuckle, and wiped away a small bit of water that had formed in her eye. "Shall we?"

Sherlock made a 'ladies first' gesture and followed her to John's office, although when they actually arrived Mary made him go in first. "John, hello."

"Hey," John replied, spinning around in his desk chair. "I didn't know you were—what the hell happened to your finger?"

"It's a sprain. Mary addressed it," he answered, throwing a thumb in Mary's direction. "She's here for you to take her blood pressure and I'm here about a—"

"How'd you sprain it?" John interrupted, ready to scold him for doing something he was sure he told him not to do.

"I fell," Sherlock lied, as he had to Mary.

"Fell?" John interrogated, to which his friend nodded. "You were in a fight, weren't you?" He reached under his desk for what he needed to take Mary's blood pressure all while still staring down Sherlock.

"I wasn't in a fight. Mrs. Hudson needed something from the attic, she asked me to get it, and I fell."

"Interesting…"

"Hardly."

"What could Mrs. Hudson possibly need from the attic?"

"Do you want to hear about a new case or not?" Sherlock tempted, knowing his friend's weak spot.

John willingly gave up trying to get the truth out of him. It was only a finger after all. "Fine." He motioned, a bit awkwardly, for Mary to come sit down by him. When she did, he wasted no time in getting the band around her arm.

"Alright," Sherlock began, sitting himself down on a file cabinet. "Twenty-two year old finishes university and proposes to his girlfriend, she accepts, everyone's happy. Three days later, he goes missing and so does the ring."

"What's interesting about that? He probably got cold feet and left." John reasoned, slipping his stethoscope beneath the armband. He pumped several times until the band had achieved maximal tightness and then gave his undivided attention to getting a read on Mary's blood pressure. A concerned look quickly spread across his face. "130 over 85, that's a bit high."

Sherlock kept on talking. "What's interesting is where he was at the time he and the ring went missing…"

"It's going to have to wait, Sherlock." John reached into a desk drawer and pulled out a second Sphygmomanometer. He then turned back to Mary. "I'll check it again."

"Why would the first reading be wrong?" Mary questioned doubtfully, but surrendered her arm anyway.

"I'm just double-checking with a larger cuff. I don't see how it could have gotten higher since the last time I checked." He did the reading again, and much to his dismay ended up with the same result. "Well then…"

Sherlock decided to weigh in on the situation. "May I suggest—"

"No." John would not have any of Sherlock's medical 'insight' right now. "I'll come by Baker Street later. Right now I need to deal with this."

"Are you telling me to leave?"

"I was trying to be subtle," John rapidly responded with the utmost sarcasm.

"Fine." The third wheel stood up and, after saying his goodbyes to Mary, made his exit, but not without a childishly pout glued fast to his lips.

The second he was out of the office, John turned his focus immediately to Mary; he was in full overprotective mode now. "So what's going on? What's different?"

"Nothing, I don't think." She looked down, racking her brain trying to pinpoint what could be the problem.

"Did you eat anything before you came in here?" Mary shook her head. "Do you need to go to the bathroom?" She shook her head 'no' again. "Did you take a sip out of someone else's coffee?" John listed several more things that could explain the higher than usual reading, but Mary's answer to all of them was 'no.' Although, the one factor his omitted seemed the most obvious and the most likely.

"It's just a tiny spike, John." She was trying to console both him and herself as she knew stressing about it would do her no good. "It could be nothing."

John gave the suggestion an extended period of thought, but didn't seem swayed by the logic. "I'll check it again tonight. See if anything's changed."

Mary just nodded and got up from the chair, leaving the office without another word. She felt like yelling in his face that the most obvious culprit behind her elevated blood pressure was the incredible stress her marriage was becoming. She was losing her patience now. She knew what she did was wrong, and she wanted nothing more than to take it all back, but for John to string her along like this for nearly four months…it was just too much. He needed time; that was fair enough. But she was sick and tired of the emotional limbo they had been living in where John would constantly worry about her, even so far as to sleep next to her in the same bed with his gun in hand and aimed at the window where an _intruder_ could (but probably wouldn't) come in, but never actually speak to her or smile at her or act anything like he had for the entire time they had been together before the big reveal.

She thought back to the morning after their wedding. John had run to the store and picked up three early pregnancy tests—just in case one malfunctioned, they would have the other two to be sure. His hands actually shook when he gave them to her; not too much, but enough to make her giggle at him inwardly.

"Now we wait," she had told him when she reemerged from the bathroom after carefully following the box instructions. Even though they both already knew what the result would be—Sherlock was so rarely wrong in his deductions—the next three minutes lasted an eternity.

Mary sat on the bed breathing in and out slowly while John paced back and forth in front of her. Neither spoke a word, but they did exchange reassuring smiles every now and then when their nervous eyes happened to meet. At long last, the timer went off, sending a sharp wave of thrill and nausea and terror through both their stomachs. When Mary went to check the tests, John tried to find something to do with his hands, placing them in five uncomfortable positions and twiddling them at the air as if there were imaginary pianos at his hips. They were clasped on top of his head when Mary came out holding the three tests and an ear to ear grin. "He was right." Her voice broke out into a delighted laugh.

John sucked in a deep breath through his instantly agape mouth and ran his fingers hard over his scalp. "You're pregnant?"

"Yes," Mary beamed, letting the happy tears in her eyes fall into ecstatic glistens on her cheeks. "I'm pregnant."

"Oh my God," John nearly wheezed, and wrapped Mary into the tightest hug he had ever given anyone. The smile on his face was nothing less than that of his wife's, he, however, made much more of an effort to fight back the tears forming in his eyes. Sure, it was just a confirmation of what they already knew, but the affirmation was more than enough to send them both into a fit of chuckles and 'I-can't-believe-it's'.

Leaning up against the wall at the clinic, hands over her six months pregnant belly, Mary tried to go back in time to that moment. It was perfect. So far from what their lives had become.

She thought back to what followed her taking the tests, after all the giddy celebration of hysterics and jubilation. She and John laid on the bed and held each other. Just held each other. "This is crazy," she whispered to him, despite there being no reason to keep her voice down.

"Tell me about it," he murmured back, staring at the spot where his hand rested on her lower belly. "If someone had told me, before last night, that I was going to be a dad… I'd have called them mental."

Mary let out a shaky breath, nervousness setting in. "Are you sure you're happy about this, John? I know it wasn't exactly planned…"

Her husband smiled at her widely, genuinely grinned. "I couldn't be happier." He rubbed his thumb lightly against her stomach. "I mean it…Never in a million years could I have seen this coming, but I don't think I've ever been so happy in my entire life."

A grin of her own spread into rosy cheeks and she planted a kiss on his lips. "I love you." She covered his hand with hers and turned her head down to her stomach. "And I love you too."

"Mary, Mary…" A voice called her from her daydream. It was Lara's; she sounded concerned. "What's the matter?"

Rejoining her present surroundings, Mary realized there were two tear tracks streaming down her cheeks and quickly wiped both of them away, embarrassment bringing a pink blush into their place. "Oh, hello Lara. Sorry, I was just being silly for a minute."

"Are you alright?" the young girl asked with a hand comfortingly on Mary's shoulder.

"Yes, I'm fine. Hormones, that's all." She figured that excuse would always go unquestioned. It seemed to work since Lara gave her a sweet smile and mentioned something about the joys of pregnancy before bouncing away to deliver a folder to another doctor. When she was gone, Mary exhaled a sigh of relief and wiped her cheeks once more to ensure any evidence of her emotional state was taken care of. 'No more daydreaming,' she told herself, although fully aware that would be impossible.

These days, Mary often went home from work a few hours earlier than John since he had been taking mornings off—the trade being that he was up playing sentry for most of the night. So, by the time John came through the door that night it was nearly seven o'clock and he found Mary asleep on the couch with one of the baby name books draped across her stomach. Lara had told him about Mary's episode today. Of course, she hadn't meant to tattle, it just came out in conversation. Interns had very little to converse about so any little bit of news was allowed. In the middle of his contemplation of whether or not to wake her so he could ask about that, his phone buzzed against his leg.

Pulling it out of his pocket, he read: _Created two-part solution to lower Mary's blood pressure. Completely safe. Come collect when convenient._

John shook his head at Sherlock and typed back: _She doesn't need medication and do not give her anything you made in your bloody kitchen!_

'Hm,' Sherlock inwardly remarked receiving John's reply. 'Testy, isn't he.'

"Tit," John griped to the air as he made his way into the kitchen. When he reached into one of the higher cabinets to grab a glass, he accidentally knocked a couple pans that had been balancing on the drying rack into the sink. "Shit!" John emitted, though the expletive was lost in the clash and clamor.

Mary jolted up from her sleeping position on the couch at the sudden racket. "What was that?" she loudly exclaimed from the living room.

"Uh, sorry, I hit a pan," John apologized, bringing the cookware back to the rack. He turned toward her drying his hands on a dish cloth. "Didn't mean to startle you."

"Well, you did a brilliant job," she quipped harmlessly, swinging her legs over the side of the couch and straightening herself out. "When did you get back?"

"Just now."

There wasn't much else to say. Mary nodded in acknowledgement and then headed to the bathroom. John took that time to conceive of a way to bring up what Lara had told him, which he knew was a subject Mary would absolutely not want to discuss; however, he really did have to mention it. If her blood pressure was up on the same day the intern found her crying in the hall chances were the two were not unrelated.

Still unsure of how to play this, John knocked lightly on the bathroom door. "Mary," he called through the wood. "When you're all done in there, we have to talk."

At the sink washing her makeup off, Mary's eyes shot to the door. Could this be it? Were they finally going to tackle the A.G.R.A. flash drive? She emerged immediately, to her husband's surprise. "What do you want to talk about?"

John practically jumped backward when she suddenly appeared in front of him. He could smell the freshly applied moisturizer on her skin and the spearmint mouthwash on her lips. "Let's sit…" He led her to the bed and sat next to her at the foot of it. Taking note of her on-guard expression, he decided that there would be no good way to ease into what he wanted to discuss, so he just blurted it out. "Lara told me you were upset at work today. She said you were…crying. And it was right after I took your blood pressure so whatever it was that made you so upset…Well, I'd like to know because it isn't good for you or the baby and it probably accounts for why the reading was high as it was."

All the anxious hope she previously had, for however brief a time, left her in a second. She felt like she'd been punched in the stomach. How could she be so stupid to think John was actually going to stop dragging his feet and take some decisive action in their marital mess? "That's what you wanted to talk about?" she deadpanned.

"Mmhm," he nodded, subconsciously bracing himself.

Mary just shook her head. All the shattered hope in her was soon replaced by pure anger at just how thick John was acting. Not only did he not come forth with the conversation that, after six months of relationship limbo, was more than overdue, but he had the nerve to ask _what_ was making her so upset! "You must be kidding."

"Mary—"

"No, John," she cut him off and came quickly off the bed. "You can't be serious. You want to know what is making me so upset?! It's you! And this whole blood thing!"

"Calm down," he tried, but it was useless.

"I will not calm down! For four months I've been patient and quiet about this mess between us. Four months! Sherlock forgave me in four days!"

"Well he's not your husband, is he?!" John stood up now too, unknowingly balling his fists. "He's not the one you're having a baby with, the one you stood up with in front of all our friends and family and made a vow to. It's more complicated than that, Mary!"

"John, I never expected you to just be fine with it all…but I put my past in front of you, everything I ever hid from you, and you've never even mentioned it." She felt tears forming in her eyes and cursed them, trying her damndest to blink them away so she wouldn't appear emotional. "I walk around here with my head down; I don't know if you love me or hate me. Or if the only reason you didn't leave is because I'm pregnant. I don't even know whether or not you ever read what was on that flash drive!"

"I need time!"

"Well I need some feedback!" There was more sadness in her voice than anger now. "One day you're sitting next to me while I sleep with a gun in your hand in case someone comes through the window, and then the next you can't even be bothered to look at me when I pass you in the hallway."

John exhaled a sigh and looked down. There was no easy way out of this. "I don't do it to make you upset." He looked back up at her and his jaw hardened. "I don't want you to be hurt all the time…but you need to understand that I didn't deserve this. I didn't deserve to be lied to like that."

She could have been mistaken, but she swore she heard a crack in his voice. "I know you didn't…and I know this _is_ what I deserve…but knowing that doesn't make it any less miserable."

A silence fell between them, mainly because there was nothing good to say at this point. John, even knowing this, decided to bring the conversation/shouting match back to its original purpose. "Well, you need to find a way to make it less miserable…for the baby. You have to keep your blood pressure down, and things like this," he motioned between them with his finger, "are not going to help that. I'm telling you this as a doctor."

Mary didn't say anything back; a strange expression came over her face. She was suddenly quite absent from the room. With contorted brows and a look of surprise, she slowly pressed a hand to her stomach on the underside of her bump.

"Mary?" John asked curiously when she didn't respond after a few seconds. "Did you hear what I said?"

She sucked in a deep breath and let it out delicately, waiting a moment. "Oh my God…" It was barely audible, practically an exhaled whisper.

"Mary…" he said again more loudly this time, carefully watching the hand on her belly move to another spot.

The smallest of smiles showed itself tugging at the corners of her mouth. "I just felt the baby kick," she said, the amazement in her eyes not at all waning.

John's expression changed now too. His eyes softened, lips parted, and just like Mary he was too overwhelmed with emotion—especially the odd convergence of anger from the fight and absolute marvel and joy from the news—to form a _real_ smile. He involuntarily let go of a relieved breath, thankful that nothing was wrong and thrilled that she had finally felt their baby. He didn't want to say anything, but he was beginning to get nervous about the lack of movement as well. But having still been tense from preceding argument, he couldn't melt into a pile of smiles and cheers. He didn't know what to do…or say.

Mary was oblivious to the slew of emotions swirling around in his eyes, though; she just kept her hand on the spot where her baby kicked her. It was no use now, her watery eyes gave up trying to be stoic and unmoved. Finally, she looked up to see John, noticing the subtlest glint occupying his eyes too, and with some uncertainty asked, "Do you want to, um… you can if you like…"

"What?" John looked like a deer in headlights.

"Do you want to feel it?" she got out, the awkwardness of the moment really sinking in now.

"Oh, I…well, I," he stammered along, unsure of what the proper response should be. He desperately wanted to feel his baby moving. Desperately. But he couldn't help but wonder if the circumstance between them—and the general state of their marriage—allowed him that privilege. After all, this should have been a very joyous and intimate moment between husband and wife…and their relationship had hardly been any of those things since the fateful night.

To his simultaneous relief and disappointment, he didn't get the chance to stutter out an answer. An impatient fist against the door to the flat disrupted the moment with muffled yet unyielding pounds. "John! Mary!" It was Sherlock. "Open the door, it's urgent!"


	7. Chapter 7

~~"John! Mary!" It was Sherlock. "Open the door, it's urgent!"~~

John hurried to answer, but upon yanking open the door found his friend standing perfectly collected on the other side.

"Hello." The taller man let himself in with a nod and smile.

"Are you alright?" Mary asked immediately, coming over to him to make sure.

"Of course I am; why wouldn't I be?"

"You were banging like a mad man," John replied incredulous. "What's so urgent?"

"Oh that," Sherlock said, remembering saying those words. "Nothing, I just wanted you to open the door. One of your neighbors was trying to start up a conversation."

"Oh, well god forbid," Mary quipped, slowly going over to the couch. Sherlock rolled his eyes at her comment, but helped her onto the seat anyway, noticing the extra effort her stomach was beginning to require.

"Why are you here, Sherlock?" John had finally shut the door and approached his friend, who, although known for oddly-timed visits, didn't appear to have a reason behind the drop-by.

"Ah yes, I needed to get out of Baker Street for an hour or so. I have reason to believe someone is going to ransack the place tonight and I figured there'd be less of a mess if I wasn't around." John and Mary hardly looked surprised. "Also, I left the desired object on the table by the door so the thief would have to be a complete idiot not to see it. Though regular people never cease to amaze me, so we'll see what happens…"

"This is for a case?" Mary clarified, just to be sure.

"Obviously. Just the groundwork, though."

"What case is this?" John automatically questioned, clearly feeling he'd not been told about this one.

"Oh, it's just a tiny thing. Domestic drama between sisters. One says the other is cheating with the boyfriend. I stole what some would call 'damning evidence' from their shared flat today in hopes that the cheating sister would come looking for it and try to take it back."

"If you knew she'd do that, why steal it in the first place?" Mary asked, looking up at him from the couch.

"Because," Sherlock sat down on the arm chair across from her, "I was able to put a small tracking device on the jewelry box—that's the thing I stole by the way, it's got an engraving from the cheating boyfriend to the cheating sister, mushy hearts and that—so when she takes it back I'll know where she hides it and be able tell the other sister. They won't speak for two to five years, she'll break it off with the boyfriend, it's all very—"

"Where'd you get the tracking device?" Mary seemed interested in the matter, much more than John. Although, it could have been her way of pushing the moment that had preceded Sherlock's entrance out of her mind.

"Borrowed it from my brother's desk. He's got a whole drawer full of things like that. They're like paper clips to him."

Mary nodded, showing some slight amusement, but John just narrowed his eyes under furrowed brows. This didn't make a lot of sense to him. "Why are you taking all these meaningless cases?"

"Meaningless?"

"All your cases, lately. They're small things, easily solved. You never took cases like that before. Why now?"

"You told me not to take dangerous cases. The both of you did." He answered in the same way a defensive child would after being caught doing something wrong and trying to flip it around to the parents.

"And you listened," John quickly replied. "There's another layer of strange. Are all these little ones somehow tied into the big one?"

"Big one?"

"The blackmail one…" he paused and groaned inwardly as realization spread across his face, "…which I'm now assuming is also tied into the boat one."

"Blackmail?" Mary cautiously expelled with surprise.

"Don't worry, your husband's just being paranoid," he murmured to her with a discreet shake of his head.

"I'm not being paranoid!"

"You're yelling."

"I'm speaking loudly!"

"I can hear you just fine."

"Apparently not, because I told you to stay away from dangerous cases and now you're wrapped up in some big, mysterious one that's got people breaking into your flat and homeless people working in the post office and government officials getting pissed off."

"You're just mad because I didn't include you," Sherlock nonchalantly deduced, though that particular deduction didn't take a sleuth. He turned his attention to Mary instead. "Are you alright?"

"What? I'm fine…" she told him, shying away from his dissecting stare.

"You just changed your breathing pattern to longer, slow breaths and the muscles in your leg tensed…" he stared a bit more intently, taking note of a tiny amount of redness in her eye and a slight cracking in the gloss she had on her lips indicating a recent smile she had tried to conceal. "And you're sneaking your hand to the lower right quadrant of your abdomen."

"No, I'm not."

He smiled anyway, ignoring her lie. "You felt it, didn't you?"

Mary broke into a smile and nodded, remembering that she had no reason to hide it. This _was_ a reason to be happy, after all. "Only right before you got here! It was incredible."

He was perfectly content congratulating her, but that type of emotional attachment to a physical action of a fetus was beyond his reach and simply did not compute with the detective. So he smiled again and issued a modest "congratulations." The smile left his face instantly and his head whipped back to John. "Now then, back to business, I shouldn't need to stay past 10. I'm sure the burglary will be finished by then; I made it quite clear I was going out. So just bear with me until then. And after I leave, you two can go back to doing whatever it is you do at night… although that's probably not too many things considering you still aren't speaking," he snidely added under his breath, turning his gaze away from both of them. John's jaw hardened defensively as he brought his chin closer to his neck. Mary just folded her arms on top of her stomach and looked down.

"I'm going to have a shower," John blurted after a long silence and left the room without a second glance.

Mary and Sherlock were left sitting alone. "So, how's the _other_ case going?" she asked him knowingly as she brought a hand to her belly.

"Hmm?" He played dumb terribly. "What other case?"

She breathed out and rolled her eyes. "Ours… I know John has you looking into who broke our window. And why they did it…"

He abandoned the charade—mainly for lack of energy. "Yeah, you're right, he does."

"I know I'm right. I'm asking you how it's going."

"No leads yet," he disappointedly delivered.

A sad but accepting nod was Mary's only reply before her attention was once again caught by her child. "Ah, there it goes again…" she said quietly, and brought both hands to the movement site. Though she wasn't being overly emotive, the true amazement in her eyes could not be concealed. Sherlock looked on, not really sure of what to do so he directed his gaze straight ahead. In doing so, he didn't see the smile on Mary's face fade into a fallen expression of hopelessness. "Do you think he'll ever come 'round?" she asked quietly, feeling thoroughly insecure for even letting the words pass her lips. "I mean, is this how it will to be?"

Sherlock turned back to her, amazed at how quickly joy could come and go. He would have liked to dismiss the sudden change as something to do with pregnancy or the hormones John was always talking about, but the pain on Mary's face was real. And to be truthful, the question was fair. Sherlock swallowed and did his best. "I meant what I said at the wedding…John is the best man I have ever known."

"I know," she nodded understandingly. "Me too."

"And he would never turn away from the people he loves."

The fear Mary had battled with for months brought a hitch to her throat, and she could barely get her next words out in anything more than a whisper. "What if he doesn't love me anymore?" It wasn't as much a question as it was an expulsion of the nauseatingly constant anxiety that taunted her every day she and John went on like this.

"He loves you." There was no doubt in Sherlock's mind and he made sure his tone reflected that.

"How can you know? I mean really know." She blinked away a tear that was threatening to fall. "There isn't a deduction for that one."

"Mary," he said quietly, but firmly, "he loves you. You're going to have to trust me on that."

She wanted to believe it. "I'll try," she said with a weak smile, and pushed herself up from the chair. "But for now, I'm going to turn in. Goodnight, Sherlock."

"Night."

As promised, Sherlock started back to Baker Street after an hour had passed. John had offered several times to go back with him, just to be sure that the would-be burglar wasn't still hanging around, but naturally Sherlock refused. "You do realize that prior to meeting you I had managed to keep myself alive," the detective told him, turning up his collar as he prepared to head off.

"Always racking my brains about that one," John quipped, opening the front door for him. "At least text me whether or not the girl actually took the jewelry box, or whatever ridiculous thing all this was about."

Sherlock muttered something inaudible and then he was gone. John accepted that he probably wouldn't be receiving any texts. He shut the door behind him, leaning against it, and stared at the emptiness of the flat. He looked to the bedroom door for a moment where Mary was sleeping, but decided against going to bed just yet. He had notes from old cases he could draft, patient paperwork he could get done, and a stack of dirty dishes in the sink. None of these tasks were at all pressing or desirable, but the restlessness he was feeling on this particular night was not going to allow him to go lie still in a bed.

Over the next three hours, he finished all his paperwork, drafted four cases to go onto the blog, and the kitchen was spotless. He split each chore with one of the many pregnancy books accumulating on the bookshelf and coffee table in the living room, figuring he should at least be familiar with whatever information Mary and Sherlock were getting from the books. He couldn't even remember where they had all come from—mostly likely Mrs. Hudson and Mrs. Holmes when they each found out Mary was expecting.

It was near 2 a.m. when he finally got into bed. Mary had been asleep for hours, and, as always, before settling down himself he checked her breathing and pulse. It was normal, so he could rest easy. He leaned back against the head board and blew out a quiet breath, glancing down at his wife. She looked peaceful. It was nice to see her that way for a change.

His eyes slowly journeyed from her face to her stomach, which by now looked like she was concealing a rugby ball under her t-shirt. Unconsciously, he started picturing his baby growing inside; wondering about little things like whose eyes it would have, what color hair, how much it would weigh.

John bit down on his bottom lip and lowered himself to Mary. The bend of his elbow rested in his pillow while his hand held up his head. He didn't know why he was suddenly so nervous, but he could feel an increasing pounding in his chest and a heat spread through his face. Delicately, he lifted the blanket off of Mary's belly and pulled it down just enough, checking to make sure she hadn't stirred. He took a deep breath, hovering his free hand just above her stomach. He checked back one more time to make sure she really was fast asleep, and then placed his hand against her. He hoped it was in the right spot. "Come on, baby…" he whispered sweetly to it, "kick for your daddy."

He waited but nothing happened. He knew a couple ways to encourage babies still in the womb to kick, but none that he could be sure wouldn't wake Mary. He moved his hand to another spot. "Are you sleeping?" he asked the air, with a small smile. He had heard Mary talking to the baby once or twice—obviously she hadn't known he was around. Now he understood why she enjoyed it so much. "Just give a little kick, just to say hi…" he pleaded again. He kept his hand on her belly for another thirty minutes, periodically moving it around. And right when he was about to give up…

The lightest thump came up beneath his hand, and his face instantly broke into a cheek-stretching grin, and then an even bigger one when he felt the little one again. "Hi there!" he said in an ecstatic whisper. A bit too loudly though. Mary began to shift and her own hand came instinctively to her middle. John moved his away just in time. When he was sure she was still asleep, he rolled over on his other side to face the window—his reason for even being in the bed. The smile that had spread so widely into his cheeks wasn't totally gone, but much smaller now. Months ago he had thought hearing the baby's heartbeat was amazing…this was better.

OOOOO

John sat comfortably in his chair at Baker Street, thumbing through the newspaper, not particularly intrigued by any of the stories. Meanwhile, Sherlock sat at the desk on his laptop, hands fixed in a steeple and eyes unmoving. "Tea, boys…" Mrs. Hudson sang, letting herself into the flat. She took note of the stagnant men and shook her head. "Well, aren't you two fun…"

"Fun is boring."

The landlady tisked at Sherlock and set the tea down on the end table by John. "You know I could tell you stories about what being stuck inside on beautiful days like can do to a person."

"Just the tea will be fine," Sherlock responded, earning a flick in the arm from the older woman.

"I'm serious, you work too much. Doesn't he, John?"

John looked up from the paper at the two, each awaiting his alliance. "Wouldn't you rather settle this in an arm wrestling match?"

Mrs. Hudson chuckled and came over to him instead, plopping down into the opposite chair. "So, how's Mary feeling? I haven't seen her in ages."

"She's alright," he replied, keeping the paper in his hands as a way of subtly saying he didn't wish to talk about it.

"And the baby?"

John smiled politely. "Also good. Kicking up a storm." That got Sherlock's attention.

Mrs. Hudson didn't notice though, just kept on asking questions. "When's she due then?"

"January. The 16th."

"Ah, almost two more months away!" She clasped her hands together excitedly. "Oh, it'll be so nice to have a baby around."

"Eleven weeks to be exact, if she goes full term."

Sherlock finally turned around. "That puts her at 28 weeks, correct?"

"…Yeah." John lowered his brows suspiciously. "Suddenly you don't know? You've been watching her pregnancy like a hawk." John had actually been shocked that at no point during the last seven months had Sherlock accidentally 'deleted' it from his mind palace.

The detective turned back around slowly. "Interesting."

"Sorry, what is?" John asked quickly, on guard now. He knew when Sherlock was about to deduce something.

"Knock, knock," came another familiar voice from the doorway.

"What are you doing here?" Sherlock asked his brother, not bothering to look up.

"Do I need a reason?" the manicured voice dismissed, twisting his cane in circles as he came into the room.

"No, you need several very profound ones," Sherlock replied, tearing his eyes away from his laptop and looking up at Mycroft. "So what is it this time? Iranian government giving you hell again?"

"Ugh, always," Mycroft groaned. "But no, that's not why I'm here."

"Then why are you here? Make it fast, I'm extremely busy."

"You're playing Pac-Man," Mycroft smugly returned. "Fingers on the arrow keys and the 'P' in case you have to pause the game, eyes traversing in perpendicular patterns that only match the map of one game." John and Mrs. Hudson exchanged humored looks with each other. Watching the Holmes brothers interact was never a bore. "The reason I came," Mycroft began, going toward the window, "is because I got a call from Mummy this morning." Sherlock narrowed his eyes at him. "If you recall, we told them you'd be out of hospital in late autumn. It's now late autumn."

"Oh no," Sherlock moaned.

"They want to come visit; see how you're doing."

"Well did you tell them not to?"

Mycroft furrowed his brow. "No."

"Great choice," Sherlock sardonically muttered.

"I told them I would be away until early December. Naturally they've decided to wait until then to visit."

Sherlock showed a hint of a smile, not a sincere one, but a smile nonetheless. "Good then, that's taken care of."

A guilty smirk lifted the corners of Mycroft's lips. "They are planning to stay until Christmas."

"What?!"

"Oh, you boys! So unpleasant the way you avoid your parents." Mrs. Hudson finally blurted, rising from the chair. "Not everyone's so lucky to have parents they can see on Christmas. Think about that." She gave each a scolding glare and shake of the head, before making her exit.

"She's right you know," John said, jerking a thumb in the direction to which Mrs. Hudson had just fled.

"Remind me again when you last saw your sister?" Sherlock quipped back.

"As a matter of fact, I saw her last week," he replied, perhaps more triumphantly than he should have. "She's in a 12-step program and has sworn off the sauce."

"Nope," Sherlock said, popping the 'p' at the end.

"Quit the 12-step program at least a month ago," Mycroft contributed.

John sunk back into his chair with an irritated frown pursing his lips. Sherlock looked back up at his brother. "What is the likelihood of getting out of Christmas at the parents' house?"

"Impossible." Mycroft had already calculated all the likely scenarios on his way over here. "It would take a nuclear crisis to change her mind and I've checked my calendar…none in the foreseeable future."

"Damn."

"It'll be one day. It's manageable."

"One day in which everyone insists on being holly jolly and assumes, for whatever reason, they are somehow happier and healthier on December 25th than they are the rest of the year when they don't stop complaining about how miserable and sick they feel."

"Mm, ghastly," Mycroft agreed.

"Oh, stop whining! The both of you," John groaned from the couch, slapping his newspaper down on the arm of the chair and coming over to them with a look even more scolding than the one Mrs. Hudson had given them a minute ago. "You're not busy, you're playing a computer game for Christ sakes, go see your parents on Christmas. They did raise you."

"Highly debatable." Sherlock responded.

"That's quite a sudden outburst of command, _Captain_ Watson. Missing the front lines again?" Mycroft insinuated coolly.

"Wrong per usual, brother mine," Sherlock said condescendingly, finally closing the laptop. "He's practicing."

"Practicing?"

"To be 'Daddy.'" He smirked in John's direction, to which his friend rolled his eyes, leaving for the kitchen. "And apparently he's already feeling the parental sympathy associated with the title."

John suddenly came back into the room. "Wait a minute, you're playing Pac-Man? If you have time to waste during whatever giant case you've been hiding, you could be working on finding the person who broke into my flat!"

Sherlock didn't say anything, but a look of mild surprise came over Mycroft's face. "You mean you haven't figured that one out yet?"

"What?" John's head whipped to the elder Holmes brother.

"You must be kidding… It's transparent."

"What are you talking about? What's he talking about?" John demanded from Sherlock.

Sherlock discreetly glared at his older brother. "He's not talking about anything."

"When did that happen John? Nearly two months ago, wasn't it?"

"'Bout that, yeah," John suspiciously answered, eyeing the both of them.

Mycroft gave a wry smile. "Do you really think that in two months, my brother couldn't put together who broke your window? It's rudimentary crime-solving."

John pensively looked over to his friend with his lips pursed into his trademark duck face as he began to see what Mycroft was getting at. "You knew…this whole time you knew who did it… and you didn't say a word?!" he yelled at the detective, anger reddening his neck.

"Nice one, Mycroft," Sherlock said, still glowering at the redhead.

"And you knew too?!" John turned and boomed to the elder Holmes.

"Obviously…I'm genuinely surprised you didn't, John."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"If Sherlock was dragging his feet on the matter, why didn't you look into it yourself?"

"I did," John quickly answered, still a little heated. "I looked for all those stupid little deduction things he does…fabric caught in the shingles, footprints in the dirt, figured out the bastard was right-handed by the way the glass broke, but that was nothing to go off of." He came back over to Sherlock who sat stoically at the desk. "That's why I believed you truly didn't know, because whoever did it was good and knew what you would look for and made sure he didn't leave a trace."

"Mycroft, unless you have any other positivity to spread, I suggest you go tend to whatever matters of national security are taking up space on your desk."

"So, who was it then?" John charged. "Tell me."

"You weren't in danger, you had no reason to know," Sherlock tried, although he knew John was not letting up without an answer.

"Cut the crap, and tell me," he repeated, more calmly but not at all less determined. "Was it Magnusson?"

"John, think," Mycroft instructed, cutting into their stare down. "You've already collected the information; now make something out of it."

"No, I'm not playing games here," John warned.

Mycroft dismissed the request. "The window is on the second story, that means the person who broke the window would have no way of erasing traces of their presence once they were back on the ground. What can we gather from that?"

John sighed aggravated by both Holmes brothers now. "You really don't know when to quit. And I already told you, there was _nothing_ to go off of. That person didn't leave anything behind."

"Oh, that's where you're wrong," Mycroft smoothly corrected. "They left everything behind. The dirt left on the roof and the ladder, from which the intruder's starting point can be determined. The broken glass would have had bits of fabric in it used to encase the instrument that broke the window—whoever did it had to muffle the sound somehow. The neighbors would have heard something; surely you thought to ask them."

"I did, they heard nothing." John's deadpanned glare shifted back and forth between Mycroft and Sherlock. "Now I'm getting real tired of being jerked around."

"They heard nothing?" Mycroft reiterated, feigning intrigue. "Huh. Curious."

"Mycroft," Sherlock warned through gritted teeth.

But Mycroft didn't seem to hear him. "Doesn't your neighbor have a dog?"

John squinted in confusion at the ground and out of annoyance. "Yeah, but the dog didn't bark when it happened, I asked Mrs.—" He stopped and realization crept up his face. "The dog didn't bark…"

"You said yourself that whoever did this was good," Mycroft said. "And knew _exactly_ what Sherlock Holmes would look for. And knew how to guarantee that he wouldn't find anything, no clues whatsoever."

John slowly turned his head to Sherlock who sat silently at the desk, still glaring at his older brother. "You cock," he said in disbelief. "You utter ball bag!"

"John, understand—"

"You dick! It was you! You broke the window!"

"Yes, it was me," Sherlock granted, after a moment's pause. "But the reason—"

"Oh I can't wait to hear this!"

"The reason I did it was very much necessary."

"Necessary?" John remarked, not even close to believing his friend.

"Yes, it was," Sherlock threw back, slightly offended.

"And _why_ was it necessary that you break into my flat and shatter my window? Which, by the way, was just a little bit stressful for my pregnant wife whose blood pressure I've been trying to keep _down_!"

"Stop being hysterical, it's annoying," Sherlock blandly requested. John emphatically crossed his arms over his chest, firmly awaiting an explanation. "On several occasions I noticed a man walking past your flat late at night, almost always around quarter to one."

"Should I even bother asking why you were there to see it at quarter to one in the morning?"

"No." John just rolled his eyes and Sherlock continued on. "The passerby always, and I mean always, looked up to your bedroom window. Then, one afternoon, I noticed he was strolling by during the day. This happened three times. People don't just break habits like that, especially not such bizarre ones at that. So, I did some digging. Apparently he's connected with Magnusson."

John's stomach leapt into his throat. "Are you sure?"

"Yes, but don't worry, he's been taken care of."

"How?"

"It's…classified," Mycroft chimed, with a don't-ask-any-further-questions gaze in John's direction.

John obliged. "So, are there any others?" he asked, dreading the answer.

"No, but the fact is, your bedroom window is street-facing and above a stoop that I've proven, and you too that one time a few months ago, is very easy to scale. Both of these things make it an easy target for a break-in. For Mary's safety, it made sense to give you a reason to stay in the bedroom with your gun."

John was still visibly annoyed, but seemed to understand. "Why didn't you just say that? Why stage a phony break-in?"

"Breaking in doubled as a message to whoever had been keeping an eye on your flat. If they think someone else is on the prowl, then they can waste their time chasing that ghost and any end goals they have will be delayed."

John just stood, taking it all in. "Be honest with me, Sherlock…is Mary in any immediate danger where we are?"

"No." Sherlock answered truthfully. "If you recall, Mycroft's men are still posing as landscapers for the surrounding houses. Imagine them as your own private defense."

'So that's why they hung around even after Sherlock went back to Baker Street,' John thought to himself. He mulled over what Sherlock had just told him, and finally, after arduous mental review, decided he would trust his friend's judgment and accept that Mary was safe, at least for now. He had one more question though. "You don't think Magnusson would…do anything to—"

"That's not his MO. Mary is only valuable to him if she is alive and well. You can relax."

John let go of a breath he hadn't realized he was holding in and nodded his head. "Alright, fine." He rubbed a hand over his forehead before looking down at his watch. "I've got to run; got clinic in half an hour." Following an automated 'goodbye,' he left the flat, still going over what Sherlock had just told him in his head.

Upon hearing the front door shut, Mycroft turned on his heel to face his brother. "There was no stalker."

"Whatever do you mean?"

"No one was walking by John and May's flat late at night, and the fact that their bedroom window faces the street makes it incredibly safe. What kind of burglar breaks into a house through a window that's in plain sight?" His scoffing expression soon changed to a smug smile. "Oh I see…well, who would have thought Sherlock Holmes a matchmaker."

The younger brother sneered and walked into the kitchen where he pulled two frozen ears out of the freezer and slapped them down onto a tray already at the table. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"You lied to John; there was never any reason for them to feel unsafe. And yet you broke their window anyway." Mycroft spun his cane between his fingers. "Explain that."

"I don't have to explain anything to you."

"Truer words were never spoken," Mycroft quipped, provoking a glare from Sherlock who was getting to work on the ears. "Anyway, I've got to be off too. Do remember to clear your schedule Christmas Day."

"I can hardly wait to pencil it into the calendar."

"Good afternoon," Mycroft said, departing for the door. "And, Sherlock, if you're going to make it a habit to succumb to bursts of emotion and marital meddling, try not to vandalize property in the process. It's getting harder and harder to convince government agents that they are somehow preserving the safety of the country by posing as landscapers in one of the lowest crime rate neighborhoods in London." And with that last comment, he was gone.

That night, John got home nearly two hours after expected thanks to the nurses being short-staffed in the A& E wing. He was exhausted and cranky from the day he had had, and wanted nothing more than to go to sleep.

He slumped through the darkened flat and found Mary already asleep in bed. Quietly, so as not to disturb her, he groped through the darkness for one of his t-shirts and a pair of shorts he had left on the dresser. When he was ready for bed, John found himself standing in the doorway connecting the bedroom with the living room. Now that he knew it had been Sherlock all along who had broken the window, he had no reason to keep watch.

He looked toward the couch and then toward Mary, and then to the couch and then back to Mary. He pulled in a deep breath and bit the corner of his mouth. He had no reason to keep watch…

No reason whatsoever.

The bed creaked just a bit when he slid into it, but not enough to wake Mary. Pulling the blankets over him, he stared at his wife—the way he always did when he came to bed at night. And just like every night, he reached out his hand and gently rested it on her pregnant belly. "Hi, baby…" he whispered with a smile. "It's daddy again."

 **A/N: Thank you for reading everyone! Feel free to leave your own speculations about Sherlock's secret ops ;)**


	8. Chapter 8

Hope everyone's still enjoying these! Your reviews mean the world to me so please leave one :)

Also, happy belated Veteran's Day for any of you who have served or are serving, and to your families as well

Happy reading!

"Did you get it?" Mary asked urgently, looking up from her baby names book when she heard the front door open. Sherlock shut the door behind him and held up the shopping bag. She sighed in the greatest relief. "Ugh, thank you so much, Sherlock. You have no idea."

"Have you been craving pineapples throughout the whole pregnancy?"

"No, this is a new one." She winced a bit as she rose to her feet, truly feeling the weight of her stomach on her ankles. "The first few months it was ice cream. Loads and loads of ice cream. Then stir-fry, with just about anything I could stir and fry into it."

"And now it's fruit?"

She finally made it to the kitchen counter where Sherlock had placed the groceries. "For the time being," she said, grabbing a knife out the rack. "Two nights ago I was desperate for tacos, so who knows how long this will last."

"Craving fruit can mean dehydration or lack of Vitamin C," Sherlock calculated, taking some of the other items out of the grocery bag. "You should drink more orange juice."

"I'm fine," she assured him, grabbing a bottle of honey mustard out of the fridge and squirting it into a bowl. Sherlock grimaced as she dipped the first piece of pineapple into the sauce which didn't go unnoticed by Mary. "I'm pregnant, leave me alone."

He put his hands up in a humble gesture of surrender, and Mary went on eating. "So, have you and John decided what you're doing for Christmas yet?"

Mary's masticating jaw slowly stopped chewing. "Sherlock," she emitted, taken slightly aback.

"What?"

"Why on earth would you assume we would have made Christmas plans together? We aren't exactly…well, you know."

Sherlock discreetly rolled his eyes and huffed out an annoyed breath. "Well do you plan on being made up by Christmas?"

"That's not up to me, is it." She smothered another pineapple cube into the honey mustard and devoured it.

The detective traced a triangle into the kitchen counter, knowing he shouldn't say what he was about to, but he mumbled it anyway. "You haven't exactly been active in getting John to come to his senses."

Mary froze. "What did you say?"

"Hm? Nothing, never mind."

She loudly set the bowl down and brought both hands to her hips. "You know, for someone who notices everything you have a terrible habit of missing what's right in front of you."

"I don't miss things, I ignore them by choice. There is a useful difference."

"And it's not like I haven't got any reason to be angry myself either!"

"Oh, do get your hormones under control. I just brought you food! And now you're yelling at me."

Mary's face softened and her arms fell to her sides. "I'm sorry…" she apologized, melting into a chair at the kitchen counter and reclaiming her disgusting fruit-sauce combination. "I'm not angry with you."

"I know," he replied, wrinkling his nose as she brought yet another mustard-covered pineapple cube to her lips.

"I just want _John_ back." Just saying it, she felt a pang in her chest and a pull in her throat. It was the sincere truth. She missed the man she loved.

Sherlock's eyes scanned her deflated expression. "Mary, I want you to come to Christmas dinner at my parents' house."

"What?" She never took the Holmes' for the family-function type.

"They are insisting we get together this year because of my…near-death incident." She shamefully looked down into her lap, biting her cheek. "They think I've just returned home from hospital."

"Sherlock, I don't belong there…I'm the reason for that incident."

"Yes, more or less…"

"More," she corrected.

"Regardless, I want you to come. John will come also."

She released a sad chuckle. "Will he? Not if I go."

Sherlock briefly looked over at the bedroom door, which was just open a crack. "Just out of curiosity, is he still staying up nights, guarding the window?"

Mary nodded. "Every night, but I'm usually asleep by the time he gets back. I try to stay up, but I'm always so exhausted."

Sherlock smirked to himself, unbeknownst to Mary. "Interesting." She gave him an odd look, but soon shook it off. "John will be ready by then. I promise."

"Don't promise, Sherlock."

He didn't respond to the request. He just flipped up his coat collar. "I should be off…I'm sure somewhere someone's baffled about something or another."

"Uh, wait a minute…" Mary said with a slight frown now playing at her lips, preventing him from leaving. "Do you have to go?" Some embarrassment came over her. "I just mean, well…ugh, sod it. I don't want to be alone today." Sherlock studied her, trying to pinpoint why before she provided him with the answer. "Maybe it's the hormones making me lonely, but I just would like someone to interact with. I haven't had a real conversation with anyone in days… not counting clinic patients." She placed one hand into the other. "You don't have to..."

Ironically, on this particular day, it just so happened that John had forgotten to bring something to eat for lunch. He could have bought something sufficient from the cafeteria, but he didn't. Besides, with Mary being in her seventh month, he didn't _hate_ the idea of paying her a visit just to make sure things were okay. So, he snuck away from the clinic for a bit and headed home. When he came through the door, he certainly did not expect the sight that welcomed him.

Sherlock sat stiff and upright on the couch, looking fairly uncomfortable with his position, but decidedly staying put. And from where he stood, John could see a blonde head resting against his friend's shoulder. "Is Mary asleep?" he asked quietly, setting his keys down on the counter and coming into the living room.

"For the past hour; she dozed off watching a film about penguins. Understandably."

John just nodded, doing his best to mask the surprise at Sherlock Holmes willingly serving as a human pillow. "Have you been here all day?"

"Just since noon. Mary had a craving for pineapple so I brought some over." John nodded again and gave his friend an appreciative nod, even though he felt a bit guilty that it hadn't been him bringing Mary the pineapple. "She dunked it in honey mustard."

John let out a soft chuckle and lowered himself into the armchair across from the couch. "Yeah, she's been eating some pretty crazy things lately. Last night it was olives in peanut butter; night before that, oatmeal tacos."

Sherlock wrinkled his nose at the last one which Mary had apparently only _partially_ admitted to him before. "Well that sounds delightful." John gave a small shrug and leaned his head onto his fist, staring at Mary as she slept. Sherlock took note, and changed the subject away from the woman still soundly sleeping on his shoulder. "Have you decided to come to Christmas yet? Or will you need more time before you inevitably say yes?"

"Sherlock…"

"You realize I will have to spend the day with my brother and parents. It'd be nice to have someone slightly more tolerable around."

" _Slightly_?"

"And Mary's coming, so—"

"What?" John's ears perked up at that, though he still kept the volume down. "Mary's going to Christmas dinner…at your parents'?"

"Yes, of course," Sherlock fibbed.

He sat back and studied his best friend, trying to determine whether or not he was being played. "Let me ask you, why do you think that Mary coming would make me want to go as well? In case you haven't noticed, we aren't in a great place right now."

"Is that why you still haven't told her the truth about the window? For two people not in a great place you spend a lot of time in bed together."

John lowered his eyes. "Knock it off."

"To be fair, that's probably the only one-on-one time you get with the baby. And you've had a lot of it apparently, evidenced by the fact that when Mrs. Hudson asked, you said it was 'kicking up a storm'…I take it you don't often feel many kicks when your wife's awake."

"You should talk," John shot back in an exaggerated whisper, still mindful to his snoozing wife. "You're the one who lied about the window in the first place."

"Yes, but you're lying to your wife. I only lied to you."

"Mary lied to me," John replied blandly.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "She had to."

"Nope."

"She lied about her former life to protect you from it. When she found out she was pregnant, she realized she had to ensure that her past could never come back to bite her. She was protecting _your_ child."

John leaned back in the chair dejectedly. "We are going to stop talking about this now."

"You brought it up," Sherlock immaturely finished.

John closed his eyes and breathed out slowly. With a subtle, self-defeated shake of his head, he finally uttered "fine."

"What?"

"I'll go," he elaborated. "To Christmas at your parents', I'll go."

"Splendid." Sherlock was genuinely pleased, of course this was masked by an 'I told you so' expression pulling at his cheeks.

"But only because it's Christmas and the last few months have been shit and Mary will be close to her due date by then so I don't want her to be out in the middle of the country with no doctor around."

"Whatever your reason."

"That _is_ my reason."

"Never said it wasn't." Sherlock smiled triumphantly and then glanced down at Mary who was still, miraculously, asleep on his shoulder. He knew John would say yes, but she would be much harder to convince. "Has she always been such a heavy sleeper?"

"Mmhm," John responded with a nod. "Plus the baby moving around kept her up last night." Sherlock gave him a knowing smirk. "Shut up."

OOOOO

"And I'm getting suspicious now… 'specially after finding all those cigarette butts in the garden the other day. So when I come home from work today I go and check it out. Just do a loop around the house. And what do you know, there's footprints!"

Sherlock dully stared back at the portly man who sat across from John and him, not at all trying to conceal his profound boredom listening to the client. "Is there more?" he obligatorily asked, hoping to remove the soporific from his flat as soon as possible.

"Well, yeah…there were two sets of prints. They lead up to the house, and then they just stopped!" the client continued with wide eyes from mentally reliving the experience. He could see his enthusiasm was not transferring to the men with whom he was sharing the ordeal. "But, and this is where things get strange, there were two sets of footprints leading to the house, but none walking away from it. Not one!"

Sherlock internally groaned at anticlimactic and seemingly interminable narrative. "And what did you make of this?"

"Isn't obvious?" the man burst. "It's a ghost sneaking through my walls and taking the money off the counter!"

John and Sherlock glanced at each other to exchange cringing faces before turning back to the client. "You think there's a ghost leaving cigarette butts in the garden and taking money off the counter?" John uttered, just to be sure he was hearing the theory correctly.

The client bewilderedly stared on. "Yeah!"

"Sherlock," John said, passing his friend the metaphorical baton.

Sherlock stayed sitting for a moment, undoubtedly calculating all the ways he could mock the man without him even realizing it. All of a sudden, he sprang up and went to the door. "Please leave now. You're an idiot." He pulled the door open for the visitor and waited for him to exit.

"What? I'm not making this up! There's something freaky going on at my house!"

Sherlock smirked to himself. "Yes, perfect choice of words."

The man scurried up from the chair. "What you mean by that?"

Sherlock rolled his eyes once more at the thickness of the man. "Your daughter's boyfriend sneaks into her bedroom at night to…well, that part's obvious. And then when they're done, he goes to the kitchen and takes the money. Don't leave money out in the open, you won't have this problem."

"My daughter doesn't have a boyfriend…"

"Yes she does, and considering he's the type to take money from you, I can't imagine why she wouldn't have told you," the detective sarcastically retorted.

"Where are getting this?"

He hung his head, actually getting exhausted now. "He comes to the house at night, by the side or the back clearly since he'd be seen coming in at the front. You took away her phone and laptop last time you caught her hiding a boyfriend so he smokes a cigarette outside and the smell alerts her that he's there. She opens the window. He climbs up to your daughter's bedroom window which I assume is directly above the spot you found the prints. And that's that."

"But," John piped up, to Sherlock's surprise. "There's no footprints leading away from the window. How's he get out?"

"I thought that part was apparent… No?" He guessed not judging by the two expectant faces awaiting an answer. "I swear, the fatuity of your brains will never stop amazing me. He walks _backwards_ on his way out. Makes him untraceable from the prints."

The client grew visibly agitated as he began to realize the truth of the situation. He directed himself toward Sherlock. "You are a cocky son of a bitch, aren't you." Sherlock didn't say anything back, although John eagerly nodded in agreement. The man shook his head and shoved his fists into his jacket pockets. "I'll kill that kid."

Sherlock nonchalantly shut the door behind him and soon the aggressive stomps down the stairs grew faint. As usual, the two men waited for the slamming of the door downstairs to confirm that their visitor had actually gone before reclaiming their lounge positions. "Expecting anyone else today?" John asked, checking his watch discreetly.

"Hm?" Sherlock looked up toward John, and then gave a shake of his head. "No, no one else today. However I am meeting Molly at three."

"What for?"

"She's got a morbidly obese person in the morgue. Need to run some tests. Oddly enough, she doesn't get many of those." John just shook his head at Sherlock's impressive insensitivity. "Here's a thought, why don't you go home to your wife."

"She's not home. She's meeting Janine for tea."

"Well go do something, I'm very busy."

The shorter man cocked his head at his friend's hurried attitude, he seemed especially short today. He didn't dwell on it though, it wasn't worth it. "Alright, fine. I'll go into the clinic early then. Unless there's any reason you might want me to stay….is there?"

Sherlock gave him a confused look. "No, why would there be?"

"No reason at all." And with one final glance at his dismissive pal, he left, briefly poking his head into Mrs. Hudson's flat to say goodbye.

Right on schedule, Sherlock went undisturbed for approximately twenty minutes before his phone buzzed against the coffee table. He effortlessly hopped over the furniture and snatched it. It read: _I'm here…please don't make me walk up to the second floor._

He smiled to himself and moseyed down the stairwell to meet his guest.

"Can I make you some tea, dear?" Mrs. Hudson asked Mary, already taking the cups out of the cabinet.

"Tea would be lovely, thank you," the blonde replied as she sat down at the kitchen table where Sherlock was already seated. She still wasn't a hundred percent sure why she was here, although she had a couple guesses.

"So," Sherlock begin enthusiastically, "let's talk."

"Alright," she allowed, apprehensively.

"Two weeks ago I asked you to come to Christmas dinner at my parents' house, you recall?" It was a rhetorical question, but Mary nodded anyway. "Have you made a decision?"

She shyly nodded again, already becoming apologetic. "Yes, I have. I won't be going. I'm sorry." She waited for Sherlock's expression to change, but it didn't. "But, you'll have John with you. That should make it more manageable."

"Here you are," Mrs. Hudson cut in, placing the tea cup in front of Mary. She still had a bit of a reach though, seeing that her eight month pregnant belly did not allow her to pull her chair all the way into the table.

"Thank you, Mrs. Hudson."

"What's the reason then?" Sherlock went on, before the landlady could start in with a story or gushy comments about the baby.

"Isn't it obvious?" she scoffed, bringing the tea to her lips and sipping. "It's Christmas…it's supposed to be a happy day. I don't want to ruin anyone else's holiday. And that's what will happen."

"My parents don't know anything about it," he offered.

"It doesn't matter. It's been months of silence between John and I, we can't just put on a happy face and pretend everything's fine."

"Loads of people do it every day," he muttered under his breath.

"Not to mention, that's just weeks before I'm due. It's already getting hard to move around. If something happens, I don't want to not be able to get to a hospital." Now she was just fishing for reasons.

"John's a doctor, he'll be right there."

She took in a deep breath, genuinely feeling bad about how hard Sherlock was trying. And what made it worse was that he was trying to come across as if he wasn't…that's how she knew it was real. "Sherlock…I wish I could go. I really do. I wish we could all be one big happy family." Mrs. Hudson, who was still puttering around the kitchen, was getting downtrodden just listening to the pain in Mary's voice. Mary looked down abashedly. "I shot you."

"Old news."

She looked up at him sadly. "I can't go to your parents' house and smile at them and have them welcome me into their house knowing that I shot their son."

Sherlock's brows furrowed in genuine surprise. "Is that was this is about?" One thing he would never excel at deducing was human emotion. Human error, sure. Human emotion…that one was tough.

"I'm going to be a mother." She unconsciously moved her hand to her stomach. "I guess I already am…in a way. And knowing what I know now about all that, I just can't face _your_ mother. I was willing to kill Magnusson because he was a threat to my child. I know how it feels now. How am I supposed to go into another mother's house, on Christmas, when a few months before I almost killed her son. _Her_ child."

Sherlock stared for a long time. He was at a complete loss for what to say. He just stared across the table at her. Mrs. Hudson had turned her attention to them a while ago, so the thick silence—so impenetrable—could not even be assuaged by clinking dishes or faucet water. Finally, Sherlock spoke. "You could have killed me. Easily. But you didn't. You saved me."

"From a wound I inflicted!"

Sherlock could see this was not going to be the easy persuasion he thought it would be. So, he had to dig deep. He flew through his mind palace…surely there was something in there pertaining to human nature. Some childhood memory that could help him understand this enough to get Mary to reconsider.

"Sherlock?" Mary called to him, when he became absent a bit too long.

He emerged from the trance nearly a full minute later. And a satisfied smile painted his lips which visibly confounded the two women in the room. "Mary, I think the amount of time it's taken John to get over this whole thing has given you a false impression of the severity of your crime. What I'm saying is: what you did is not as terrible as you may think." Mary didn't seem to believe him, but the look on her face showed she was willing to listen. "You were willing to kill a very powerful man to protect your child. As far as good reasons to kill other human beings go—I don't think you'll find many mothers who wouldn't do the same. Mine included." She listened on, really letting his words sink in. "When I was eleven, we lived in the city for a year. Our parents thought the move would help us learn to fraternize with other children. The plan failed, I mean _really_ went down in flames. The other children were so stupid. But one boy in particular, Edwin Byrne, especially hated me. Bullied me constantly." A surprised sadness came over Mary's face. She never imagined Sherlock being bullied, but hearing the idea now could see how it would make sense. "One afternoon, Edwin took it too far. He and his friends grabbed me at my locker, dragged me all the way upstairs to the roof. They hung me over the side, pretending they were going to drop me. Truly one of the scariest things to ever happen to me, until I discovered nine separate ways to land without a scratch. It actually turned out to be a useful experience later on in life…as you know. My mum was outside the building waiting to pick me up, saw the whole thing and sprinted into the school and up to the roof. She pulled me up from the ledge and put all three boys in a chokehold."

"You're kidding?!"

"I remember you telling me that story," Mrs. Hudson recalled from her place at the sink. "Little punks deserved it if you ask me."

"Needless to say, their parents pressed charges, one of which being attempted murder," Sherlock finished complacently. "We moved out of the city, switched schools, never saw the boy again. Of course, the charges were expunged thanks to a relative who occupied a minor position in the county judicial system." Mary raised a brow. "And we almost never spoke of it again."

"You aren't lying to me, are you?" Mary asked, just to be absolutely sure, though she didn't think he was.

And he genuinely wasn't. "No," was all he said, a bit solemnly. "So, you're tormented at the idea of coming face to face with my mother when, in fact, she did nearly the same thing you did. The only exception being that she didn't kill the boys because the teachers intervened. You didn't kill me because your marksmanship is near perfect and you had no intention of doing so."

"What if she sees me as another Edwin Byrne?"

"Edwin Byrne was acting as a ruthless bully," Sherlock replied. "You were acting as a protective mother."

Mary could hardly wrap her head around what she heard just heard, and from _whom_ she had heard it. She thought for a long time, breaking up her thoughts with intermittent sips of tea. When finally, she came to her decision. "I'll go."

Sherlock was thrilled, but didn't dare show it. "Excellent choice," he said, knowing this whole mess would soon be over—along with the case John had been badgering him about.


	9. Chapter 9

When John and Mary entered their building following yet another doctor's appointment, they were met—so very dishearteningly—by one of the cruelest signs a pregnant woman can behold: ELEVATOR OUT OF ORDER.

"They must be joking…" Mary remarked incredulously to herself, since she knew her husband likely wouldn't be responding (he hadn't uttered a word all day, save for the doctor's medical questions).

John did however look annoyed at the sign as well, and felt bad for what it meant for Mary, but she didn't notice. "Maybe I can get it working," he proposed softly.

Her eyes briefly widened at the fact that he had spoken, but she declined the offer. "No, no…I can take the stairs. Clearly they just didn't get the memo that there's a woman 30 weeks pregnant living on the second floor."

John only nodded and took the first step, holding out his hand for Mary which she gladly accepted. They made their way up slowly, only stopping once. With only 7 weeks to go, Mary was being treated to the gestational works. Her back ached, her ankles were swollen, she was always exhausted, and of course, her stomach was growing every day. Most people who took an interest often remarked how well she carried the weight. Patients did not usually guess she was already as far along as she was, but that didn't help her. She felt huge.

When they finally made it all the way up, she leaned against the wall, trying to mask how out of breath she was. John saw right past it though. "Are you alright?" he asked, thumbing through his keys for the right one.

She nodded. "Yeah, I'm fine…perfectly."

He gave her a second look of concern, trying to decide if he should check her out when they got inside, and then pushed the door open. Mary went in and headed straight for the bedroom. By the time John came in, she was already laying down with a hand over her forehead. She had had a headache all day, mainly from the gut wrenching anxiety persisting at the fact that two days from now she would be sitting down to Christmas dinner at the Holmes'. She still wasn't sure how she was going to do it.

John eyed her as he hung up his jacket and scarf in the closet. "You sure you're okay?"

"Yes, John, I'm fine! Stop being so worried all the time," she snapped, immediately regretting being so hostile.

John was taken aback by the sudden mood swing. Sure, she had plenty of those these days, just usually not directed at him. He mumbled something like "fine" and left the room. It was clear she didn't want to be around him and, though he hated to admit it, that was fair.

He ventured into the living room and took a seat in the armchair. All the Christmas shopping was finished, all the recent cases were blogged, and neither he nor Mary had to go into work today. There was literally nothing to do. He couldn't leave though, he refused to. Mary had been… _off_ for the past few days, and even though he felt it had something—if not everything—to do with the Christmas plans, he didn't want to risk leaving her alone and having something happen. So, he just sat.

For two hours.

He was pretending to be interested in the paint swatches that were scattered on the coffee table (as they had been for months) when he heard an impatient knock at the door. He practically leapt up off the chair to go answer it. "Sherlock, hey."

"Hello John." Sherlock briskly entered the home, shedding his coat as he walked and tossing it carelessly onto the couch, to which John scowled and rolled his eyes. "Is Mary here?"

"Yeah, course… We got back from the doctors a while ago," John reported, following his friend into the living room.

Sherlock turned to take one quick look at John and then plopped down into the armchair previously occupied by the ex-soldier. "Yes, two hours ago. Sorry it didn't go the way you'd hoped."

John looked down, despite knowing it wouldn't hide anything from the sleuth. "Mary got a good report. Baby's heartbeat sounds strong. Everything went well."

"Except you didn't get a new sonogram like you always do and you still haven't found out the sex."

The army doctor exhaled heavily and sunk into the couch. "Why do you always have to do that?"

"Do what?"

"Embellish things even when you know they're shitty just to remind everyone you're clever." Now it was John who was snapping.

Sherlock didn't seem affected. "Are you making your gloom more obvious as a way to tell me I'm not that clever?"

"Just shut up."

"Oh, if it were that simple…" Sherlock quietly cracked to himself. "Where is your wife, anyway?"

"She's lying down." He leaned his head back into the cushion. "Bit worn out."

Sherlock gave an understanding nod, tapping his fingers against the chair. "And you're sitting out here alone because…?"

"She doesn't want me in there. She's tired, she's achy, and I'm pretty sure she hates my guts."

"Stupid saying."

"Yeah well, it seems to apply." John looked down into his hands where his fingers were unconsciously playing with his wedding ring. He stopped immediately before Sherlock could start in on it. "Were you just in the neighborhood?"

"Actually I need your assistance."

"With what?"

Sherlock raised a brow. "A case, what else?"

"Really?" They hadn't truly been on a case together in ages. John figured it was Sherlock's way of punishing him for not getting back together with Mary—the same way a child lashes out against divorced parents for not making it work.

"Thirty-eight year old male sleeps over his girlfriend's house for the first time. The girlfriend is a forty year old mother of two teenagers, a girl and a boy. They go to bed, all the windows are bolted shut, and the door is locked. He wakes up the next morning with bruises all over his body and no idea how they got there. Door is still locked, windows still shut, and no one else in the house heard a sound. Thoughts?"

John still seemed suspicious of what was being asked of him. "You want me to help you solve something like this? You really don't have any ideas?"

"Of course I have ideas," Sherlock quickly replied. "But if you tell me yours it will help me eliminate some of them."

"So, my ideas that coincide with your ideas will be the ones that you—"

"Eliminate," he said in an obvious tone.

John's jaw hardened into an irritated scowl once again. "You can't take one day off from being a dick, can you?"

"Stop being sensitive."

"I'm not being sensitive. You came over here just to call me an idiot."

"Pretty sure you're the one name-calling," Sherlock mumbled, folding his hands in his lap.

"I'm not name-calling." John exaggeratedly folded his arms across his chest and sulked. He was clearly uptight and did not have an ounce of willpower or energy to conceal it from his friend.

"Let me ask you, why haven't you seen your therapist at all during all this?" Sherlock posed, but John didn't seem to understand the question. "You had a therapist, as most ex-soldiers do, you saw her every now and then, but not once during this debacle with your assassin wife. Why not?"

John thought it over for a moment, and then shrugged. "Didn't need to."

"Lying," Sherlock instantly deduced.

"Didn't _want_ to," John tried, hoping that'd be the end of it.

"Why not?"

"I don't know…"

"Yes you do."

"Sherlock—"

"You were protecting her, weren't you? Sure, doctors are supposed to take that confidentiality oath or whatever it is, but you weren't willing to take the chance."

"If you already know the answer, why ask the question?"

Sherlock lackadaisically shrugged. "To see if other people know the answer."

John huffed loudly, evidently not amused. "I didn't want to risk the therapist somehow being someone who could be interested in that information. Saying anything to anyone might put Mary in danger. I didn't want to do that. Happy?" The taller man appeared to be, so John moved right ahead to the supposed reason for him coming over. "The bloke with the bruises could be sleepwalking. He's banging himself up during the night and doesn't even know it."

"Could be…" Sherlock said with a slow nod, though he didn't seem satisfied. "However if he were sleep walking enough to injure himself surely he'd cause some sort of ruckus. Loud enough to wake the girlfriend."

"You know, if you want a medical opinion, I'd actually have to see the bruises."

"I suppose; are you free tomorrow?"

John gave him a look. "Tomorrow's Christmas Eve."

"So?"

"So, it's Christmas Eve…" he repeated for him, still not getting through. "I'll be busy, and so will your client. Everyone in London will be running around like crazies."

"What could you possibly have to do?" Sherlock pestered.

"Last minute shopping," John answered, in a slightly obvious tone. "Plus Mary volunteered to make something for your parents' dinner, and since she can hardly get around, I'll be picking up all the ingredients…and most likely baking the bloody thing."

"What is it?"

"Irish cream and chocolate cheesecake."

"Mm, nice…"

"Yeah well, we'll see how my rendition of it goes…" John looked down for a moment, mulling over the baking process; and then, something hit him. Immediately he looked back up at Sherlock. "Alright, really why are you here?"

"What are you talking about? I told you why," Sherlock quickly retorted, feigning offence.

John just shook his head. "Nope, no," he said waving his index. "You didn't come here to ask me about unexplained bruises and you didn't come over to talk about desserts."

"You're getting very paranoid in the third trimester," the detective coolly quipped.

"Sherlock…"

"Testy too…something weighing on your mind?"

"Oh gee, what could _possibly_ be occupying my brain right now?" John sarcastically returned, adapting a mock-confused expression. "Bit of a head-scratcher that one."

Sherlock smiled to himself. It was so easy to get his friend riled up these days. "Do all expectant fathers get this way?"

John let out a heavy sigh. "You're just gonna jerk me around then? Is this a wind-up?"

Finally, Sherlock apologetically called a truce. "I'm sorry, I couldn't resist. If you must know, the real reason I came over here is because…well, I actually do need your help, but not with the case. I have a potential explanation for that one, it's just a matter of testing it."

"What is it?"

"The son is pulling a prank, one he thinks is harmless. He found his mother's pills in the bathroom and confused them for some type of woman medication. He crushed them up and gave them to his new daddy—he probably figured the man would grow breasts or start speaking a few octaves higher. If you had met this boy, you'd understand better. He's a complete idiot. However, the only pills the mother is currently on are—"

"Blood thinners," John finished, catching onto the theory. "She's got thrombophilia then….so the boyfriend whose blood is perfectly fine takes the pills and suddenly bruises like a peach. Huh, that's simple enough."

"Rudimentary."

"So what was the actual reason for coming over?"

Sherlock seemed to withdraw a bit, almost as if he were…embarrassed? And then, for the first time, John realized Sherlock had not come empty-handed when his friend pulled a shopping back out from behind his feet. The trench coat had been concealing it all the while they were conversing.

"I need your opinion," Sherlock proceeded, "on this." He pulled out two items from the bag. In one hand he held a tiny bucket of foam blocks; each had a different picture and texture on one of the six faces. In the other hand he held a bright blue mobile, from which hung various shapes made to represent different objects—the sphere was a globe, the cube was a mailbox, the prism was a mountain.

John couldn't stop the smile spreading at his lips or the warm feeling rising in his chest. "You got the baby a Christmas present?"

"The woman in the store said these would help develop cognitive skills by introducing some basic ideas in an interactive way. I don't know if that's true. Also, the mobile plays music when you turn the key." He then remembered something and set the pail of blocks down to reach into the bag. "I got this handkerchief as well…it'll help the baby with object permanence. Peek-a-boo used to be the way to go, but I guess this is the new trend."

John was chuffed. "Sherlock, these are lovely presents; it's very sweet of you."

Sherlock gave a subtle but appreciative nod, still holding up the toys. "I just wanted to make sure you hadn't already gotten these, and that the colors were okay. The mobile came in pink, yellow, and orange. And there were other sets of blocks with different pictures. Barnyard animals, urban landmarks, those sorts of things."

John took the bucket of blocks from Sherlock and gazed down at it. His happy expression soon faded, though. "I don't even know if I'm going to have a son or a daughter…" he murmured. It took a second or two, but he shook off the sudden melancholy and handed the blocks back to Sherlock. "Both presents are great, really mate, well done."

"Thank you." He delicately put the items back into the shopping back. "I wanted to show Mary, but if she's not feeling well…"

"Oh, I don't think she'd mind. You should show her," John said with a light, but not very cheerful chuckle. "Actually, I think she'd quite like to see it."

"Alright then." Sherlock stood up and collected the shopping bag. Not five minutes after he optimistically marched into the bedroom where Mary was resting, John heard the muffled sounds of happy sobs and Mary's 'aww's.' He smiled sadly and looked toward the cedar chest that sat in front of the living room window, coming up just below the pane. John rose and shuffled toward it slowly, pulling open the lid with a low creek of the hinges. He smiled down into the chest and took out a light green onesie that he had bought months ago, the week after he found out Mary was pregnant to be precise. The fabric was soft against his thumb and warm from being in a box that sat in the sun all day. He didn't stare at it for too long for fear of getting caught by Mary or Sherlock, but taking this brief moment to remind himself it was there had a way of kicking something—an idea—into motion.

That night, John was lying on his back staring blankly up at the bedroom ceiling. There were so many things swirling around in his head, he couldn't pinpoint which ones to give more attention to and which ones to save for another day. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the flashdrive. A.G.R.A. stared him in the face. He twirled it between his fingers a few times, occasionally glancing over at his slumbering wife who had her back to him.

He played their wedding vows in his head, her laughs from their first date, Sherlock plummeting from the roof of St. Bart's, Afghanistan, Moriarty by the swimming pool, the first sonogram, being thrown into the Guy Fawkes fire, hearing the baby's heartbeat, wrestling with the 7 foot assassin, waking up that morning. Finally, he heard Sherlock's voice echo in his head "You chose her…"

All these images spun around his brain like an out of control carousel of his life. And then suddenly, everything stopped. His mind went completely blank and a calmness came over him. And then, without even realizing it, tears began to fall from his eyes, slowly streaming down his cheeks. He inwardly cursed himself and wiped them away, but more came into their place. He gave the flash drive one more glance and then stuffed it back into his pocket. The tears let up and when they did he finally felt…good. It was such a simple feeling and there really was no other way to describe it. He hadn't felt this way for some time.

He did choose her, didn't he… He saw something in her—something dangerous, wonderful, and an absolutely perfect match for everything in him. He had spent the last seven months unable to come to terms with it all…but what exactly had he been trying to accept? He told himself it was Mary…but that just wasn't true, was it? Mary turned out to be the woman of his dreams. What did that mean about him? It meant Sherlock was right. Per usual. He _was_ twisted. Abnormally attracted to dangerous people and situations. He'd been fighting that unappealing truth since he came back from Afghanistan, but there it was again clear as day, large as bloody life. He chose her…and even more importantly, she chose him.

He turned onto his side and began to drift off to sleep. He shouldn't have fought it for so long. It was always going to be Mary. And he was finally ready to make peace with that.

OOOOO

 ** _"The problems of your past are your business; the problems of your future are my privilege."_**

OOOOO

It wasn't Christmas anymore, not technically anyway. It was past twelve when John and Mary finally made it back to their flat in London. They were both exhausted and still numb from how the events of the day had transpired. "I can't believe he did that…" Mary whispered so softly it was a miracle John had heard it. "I just… can't believe he did that." She was completely at a loss for words sinking down onto the foot of the bed.

John, equally drained, sat down next to her and placed his hand over hers. "I can believe it," he said nearly as softly. "Easily."

Mary shook her head, tears welling up in her troubled eyes (she was surprised there were any left; she sobbed almost the whole car ride home from the Holmes' estate.) "You know, he's always saying 'high-functioning sociopath' and that…but he's not." She turned her sad eyes to John. "He's not."

He just nodded. "I know."

"Surely there must be something they can do; I mean Mycroft basically is the British government, isn't he? For his own brother, I'm sure he could figure out something."

"He assured me he was going to do whatever he could to help Sherlock," John offered, hoping it would calm her down a little bit. "The tricky thing is, Magnusson never actually committed any crimes that someone could prove. All his blackmail stuff…all in his head."

"I know," Mary responded sadly. "Sherlock texted me to tell me about Appledore."

"Course he did," John mused. He gave a little chuckle, the way people do when they are too distraught to be sad. "I wonder how much trouble Sherlock's causing in whatever cell they're putting him in for the night."

Mary tried to smile, but it proved difficult. "I don't know how to feel, John," she admitted. "I was thrilled before when you said what you did…and knowing that Magnusson is gone is, well…" she instinctively brought a hand protectively to her tummy. "More than words can say." John squeezed her other hand and pressed a kiss into her hair. "But Sherlock in custody for trying to help me… it's awful and wrong. It makes me feel sick. I mean it, how could I let him do this? I should have known he would go straight for Magnusson. What was I—"

"Mary," John quickly cut her off, before she could work herself into hysterics. "Don't do that now. Sherlock will be alright." She didn't seem so sure, so John gave her hand another reassuring squeeze. "He always gets out of these things. Oi, this is the guy who faked his own suicide on a crowded street in the middle of London and managed to go with it for two years. He'll be alright. I know it."

"Do you?" Mary hoped John wasn't just trying to convince himself. After everything they had all been through in the last year, she desperately wanted some normalcy. At least for a little while.

"I do…" John confidently answered, and after a couple seconds even managed to get a small smile out of his wife. "But I don't need you panicking now. Today was exciting enough without you sending yourself into early labor."

"Alright, I'll try to relax…as much as possible anyway." A comfortable silence hung in the room, only to be disrupted by the sudden buzz of John's phone. He immediately yanked it out of his pocket and felt an enormous relief come over him when he saw it was a text from Sherlock. "What's he say?" Mary jabbed, leaning over to read it herself.

 _This person who designed this jail cell is an idiot. 23 easy ways to escape and counting._

They both chuckled at the text, relieved to see Sherlock was holding up well. "Why on Earth did they let him keep his phone?" Mary quite rightly asked.

"My guess is they took it away and he swiped it back within the next six seconds without anyone knowing. It's amazing he doesn't have a more impressive criminal record."

Mary nodded in agreement and then gasped loudly. "Ooh, big kick," she said, rubbing the spot on her belly the baby had just struck.

"Oh, uh yeah?" John released a nervous laugh, not quite sure what the protocol was now. "Could I…I mean, do you want me to …now that we're, uh…"

She just smiled at her squirming husband understandingly. "Let me see your hand." She didn't wait for him to present it to her, she grabbed the hand that had been previously resting on his knee and placed it just below her belly button. "Now just give it a second… Ah, there it is!"

John and Mary's faces both lit up when they felt their baby move under his hand, and they couldn't help breaking into a laugh when it kept going. "I love this…"

"Yeah?" Mary smiled widely watching him watch her belly.

He just continued to grin and nodded. The baby kicked four more times before John realized something, and his smiling face became sort of guilty. "Mary, I have a confession to make."

She cocked her head to the side. "What is it?"

"This isn't the first time I've felt the baby." She pushed her lips together into a tight, questioning smirk, believing that she already knew what he was going to say next. "Most nights…after you fell asleep, I tried to feel the baby moving. I didn't know how to ask you if I could…I didn't think you had any reason to say yes."

"John, of course I would have said yes," Mary replied, rubbing his shoulder tenderly. "And I have something to confess too…"

"Oh?"

She guiltily smiled through compressed lips. "I knew."

"You knew?!" He was genuinely, though happily, surprised. "How?"

"Well, Sherlock told me about the window…"

"What? He told you he was the one who broke it?" Mary nodded apologetically. "Dickhead, that's what he is."

"He spilled the beans to me after Mycroft spilled the beans to you," she elaborated, glancing over at the window in question. "I wasn't sure why you wanted to keep sleeping in here. I thought…I thought you hated me."

"Mary…"

"No, it's alright," she assured him, patting his leg gently. "So one night I was nodding off, not really asleep yet. And I felt you pull the covers down, and then I felt your hand on my stomach. And then I…" she beamed at him. "I heard you talking to the baby. After that I tried staying awake for that part, but I almost never could. It was so, so nice."

John smiled back at her, pausing to watch the dim lights in the room shine in her eyes before pulling her a little bit closer to kiss her cheek. He looked her firmly in the eye. "I never hated you. Not once."

It was something she didn't expect to hear and it was subsequently added to the long list of things he could say that would bring tears to her eyes—the good kind, of course. She smiled at him again, this time only though her eyes. Bringing both her hands to his face, she met him in a deep and long-awaited kiss—their first since John had discovered her true identity. And it felt like all the magic of a first kiss held together by the constancy and safety of the feeling one gets when they kiss the person they have vowed to spend the rest of their life with.

When he pulled away, his face was more serious. "Mary, there's something else I want you to know."

"Go on then."

He bit at his cheek as he formulated how to say the words he wanted to say without sounding too sappy. "Do you remember the night Sherlock came back into my life, into our lives?"

"Is that really a question?" she said in a 'duh' tone.

He nodded with a light chuckle. "Yeah, well, when that happened, I was angry at him, obviously. And I wouldn't blame you for wondering why it took me so long to get over that big mess of me not knowing about your past when I forgave Sherlock for doing what he did in just a few days."

"Oh…" Mary sheepishly looked away. Of course she wondered about that!

"It's a fair question, and the simple answer is, I was much more hurt knowing you had kept something from me than I was knowing Sherlock had. And not just because I expect these things from him."

"Okay," Mary said softly, suspecting there was more.

"The reason it took me so long to move past it goes beyond that simple fact that you're my wife and I am so in love with you…" he hadn't practiced this part, and now he was wishing he had. "You're my life, Mary. I love the other people in my life; Sherlock, Mrs. Hudson, the lot of them. But no one in this world could ever replace what you are to me. You saved me, in more ways than one. You're the best person I have ever known, and I could not actually imagine anyone other than you who I would want to share a child with. And," he took a breath when he felt a wateriness sneaking into his eyes, "when I found out that you were not who I thought you were… I felt like I had lost something, everything actually. I thought everything in my life that was good and normal and perfect was gone. I couldn't come to terms with the fact that you may have been too good to be true. And, even more difficult to take… I couldn't come to terms with the fact that part of me was…kind of relieved and, in a way, thrilled to find out about who you were before."

"John," Mary also begun to get emotional, but she cursed her hormones for that.

"But knowing who you are now… and it took me a while to realize this…knowing who you are now," he sighed a heavy sigh that brought a smile to his lips. "You are the only person I could ever spend the rest of my life with. It took me too long, but Sherlock was right. I saw all of that in you, and I fell in love with you." Mary smiled through her tears and kissed him tenderly. "You're an amazing person, Mary. And I'm so sorry I couldn't get over all of this sooner. If there's anything I could take back, it'd be these last few months."

"You really won't be happy until we both drown will you," she laughed, wiping the tears off her face. John laughed too and helped her dry her cheeks.

"Don't cry, this is a good thing…" he tried with another laugh.

"Yes, I know," she replied grinning. She hugged his neck tightly, and didn't let go for quite some time. When she finally did, their eyes met in a loving gaze. It felt like the last piece of dust in the war had settled and the sun was finally coming out. John pressed a long kiss into her lips, and then another.

The kisses slowly transformed into something more intense as they both allowed themselves to fall back on to the bed, scooting their bodies closer to the center, and never once breaking the connection. It had been such a long time. Mary wrapped her arms around John, bringing him closer as their mouths grew hungrier for each other.

It wasn't until Mary's fingers began fiddling with the buttons on his shirt that John suddenly pulled back. "Mary, wait…" he protested through already labored breaths.

"What's the matter?"

He sighed regretfully and leaned his head down into the crook of her neck, a bit embarrassed. "You know, I've always told my patients it's alright… doing this during pregnancy," he motioned between them. "But now that it's you and our baby…I'm actually nervous. I don't want to do anything wrong."

Mary raised her eyebrows and chuckled at him. "Really?"

"Ugh…it's stupid. I'm a bloody doctor, and you're a nurse, I shouldn't be worried about it!"

A nervous look crossed Mary's face suddenly. "You aren't just saying this because you aren't ready yet, are you? I know you said you've forgiven me, but if you still need more time—"

"No!" John instantly blurted. "No, trust me, I want to. I really, _really_ want to. I've missed you, Mary. So much. And I don't mean just because of this… though I have missed that." He sucked in a deep breath and made himself stop talking. "I'm rubbish."

She smiled up at him, hands interlocked behind his neck. "John Watson, you are anything but rubbish." She graced his lips with a light peck. "Have you been this much of a basket case throughout the whole pregnancy?"

"Just ask Sherlock, he's had the brunt of it," he admitted with a laugh as he pushed her bangs off her face. "It's hard finding the middle ground between husband and doctor when you're wife is carrying your child."

"Well, as a doctor, what would you say about this?" she asked, referring to what was about to take place on the bed.

His cheeks stretched into a smile, showing how silly he felt about his concern. "As a doctor, I'd have to say it's perfectly safe as long as you pay close attention to how she's feeling."

"Well, in that case…what would you say about this as a husband?" she coyly followed up.

This time he didn't answer with words. He just met her lips in a heated kiss even more amorous than the one before it. And for the first time in what they both knew was far too long, they made love.

It was nearly two hours later when they found themselves lying under the covers together, completely spent. Though it felt extremely cliché, they both internally resolved that they had never quite experienced anything like _that_.

"My God," John panted, staring up at the ceiling.

"Yeah…" Mary concurred in a breathy gasp.

He turned his head to her and reached for her hand. "And you're alright?"

She gave him an exhausted, but sultry smile. "Oh yeah."

He nodded, still attempting to bring down his heart rate. "Good." He couldn't believe how much her body had changed since the last time he had been with her. Sure, he had seen pregnant bellies before, he was a doctor after all. But this was Mary, _his_ Mary, carrying his baby. He truly couldn't remember a time she looked more beautiful. "Sweetheart," he whispered to her through the darkness.

"Hm?" John could tell she was beginning to doze off now.

He smiled and wrapped her up in his arms. "I'm sorry I took so long to say what I said."

"It's alright John, I understand. I really do. I didn't at first, but—"

"Let me finish," he said with a smile, gently rubbing his fingertips against her bare arms. "You should know, it was never really about forgiving you…to be honest, I forgave you a long time ago. I just didn't know how to move on from it. Or where to go from there. I was just really…stuck."

Even in her grogginess, Mary could feel what he meant by that. She touched her lips to the closest part of him she could reach, his chest. "I will never lie to you again, John. I promise."

He kissed the top of her head and rested his chin against her temple. "I know."

"Maybe about some things…you know, like those sweaters you love."

John smiled through pressed lips, chuckling into her hair. They drifted off to sleep holding each other, finally feeling that all would be well, even in the face of whatever news about Sherlock came to them tomorrow.


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N: Hello everyone, thank you for all the lovely reviews! I just wanted to let you all know that although Mary and John have finally reconciled in the last chapter, there is still plenty of story left so I will continue updating. And I will try my best not to wait too long in between chapter to post. Thanks for keeping with it, enjoy this next one!**

OOOOO

"So, I heard Mary and John have sorted it out," Molly said into the phone. "Back together, the way it should be."

"News travels fast," Sherlock replied, smiling at her through the pane of glass that separated them. He had had many visitors today—Mrs. Hudson, John and Mary, his parents, Lestrade, Andersen, even Mycroft—and so far Molly was the only one who didn't seem to want to comfort him about his present incarceration. He had a few guesses why.

"Did you know already?" she asked in surprise.

"Of course I knew," he replied cockily. "Do you think John ever makes any decision without narrating it in full to me first? You should hear him deliberate over pizza toppings."

She smiled and looked down. "So, I should be getting back to St. Bart's…lots of bodies to be sorted."

"Just like in here." Sherlock paused to check on the position of the guard, who he had already deduced was an idiot of a man far too concerned about the fact that he would soon be coming out to his family to be paying attention to Sherlock and Molly's conversation. "Have you spoken to Mycroft about…?"

Molly nodded discreetly. "Just putting the final touches on everything."

He gave his own subtle nod. "Alright then."

"Don't worry," she said reassuringly before slowly getting up from her seat. "Goodbye Sherlock."

OOOOO

"Hello Dr. Watson," greeted a smiling, but slightly surprised Lara. John wasn't sure why she looked so befuddled, and then it hit him. The intern had not seen him smile this profoundly in months. He didn't bother trying to contain it, he was far too ecstatic. "Are you alright?" she asked, unintentionally embellishing just how strange it was for him to look so happy.

"Hm?" he acknowledged, though he was quite in his own world. "Oh, course I am. Never better." He gave a finite nod and began to walk away, but stopped quickly after a few steps. "Oh, and Lara, could you please make sure exam room four is free in about forty minutes. I'll need it until eleven."

"Okay," she complied with a nod, still unsure of what had the doctor so giddy.

"Thank you very much," he practically sang, continuing on his way. When he got to his office, Mary was already seated at his desk, munching on a breakfast sandwich. His smile broke into a grin. "What are you doing here?" he asked in surprise, as he greeted her with a kiss. "I thought you weren't coming in for another hour."

She swallowed what she had been chomping on and put the sandwich down with a smile. "I couldn't wait," she said, scrunching herself up in adorable excitement. "Are you still too busy?"

John bit his lip and looked regrettably at a stack of files he was supposed to get through before Mary's arrival. "No, no I'm not," he decided, bringing his attention back to her. "That can wait."

"Good," she beamed, pulling his face into a kiss. Her hands gracefully fell into her lap where they could cradle her belly and a deep inhalation brought her chest up, its immediate release signaling her readiness. "Shall we then?"

"Yes," John nodded, taking both her hands to pull her up out of the seat. "There we go," he said elevating her, trying to suppress a grunt from the challenge of lifting his eight months pregnant wife. "You okay?"

"Mmhm," Mary nodded as she began to waddle out of the office, visibly exhausted. "Ooh! Honey, could you grab my sandwich before we go please…"

"Yep." John's face instantly wrinkled in disgust when he caught a whiff of it. "Sorry, is this egg, bacon and…"

"Relish," Mary happily finished, reclaiming her second breakfast of the day from him and taking a big bite out of it.

"God that smells terrible."

"It tastes heavenly, try some." She thrust the concoction in his direction making him recoil back.

"Not for all the riches in the world."

"Dr. Watson," a girl's voice called from down the hall, interrupting the aromatic assault. It was Lara hurrying up to the pair with a file folder in her hand. "Oh, hi Mary." Mary returned the 'hello' and Lara turned back to John. "Mr. McDonald is here for a refill of the prescription you gave him last week. He says he's very busy and needs it right away."

"He's a prick," John replied, reaching for the handle of exam room two. "Tell him he'll have to wait like everyone else and if he can't wait then he'll have to come back later."

"Okay," the intern said with a nervous nod as she turned to leave.

"Oh, and Lara…" She spun back around. "Don't worry about that exam room I asked you to keep open. I'll be using this one." She respectfully nodded again and then took off to deal with the waiting room.

"Mr. McDonald," Mary thought out loud after the girl had gone. "Why does that sound familiar?"

"Erectile Dysfunction," John answered, leading her into the room. "Comes in every other week for his blue pills."

Mary made a face and shook the mental image. "Okay, done with that."

"Thank God." John helped her up onto the examination table and made sure she was comfortable. The ultrasound machine was already in the room and they both felt their heart rates quicken just a tad as John wheeled it over. They had waited a long time for this. He let out a heavy sigh and smiled through his sudden anxiousness. "You ready?"

"Uh-huh," she said with a smile and an excited nod as John motioned for her to lift up her shirt. She obliged and watched as he squeezed the blue gel onto her abdomen, flinching at how cold it was. "Never quite get used to that."

John gave her a smile and took her hand in his, leaving his other free to operate the eye of the transducer. "Alright then…let's see."

Mary lay back on the inclined table and breathed in slowly. "I can't believe it…we're finally going to know."

John looked back at her and smiled, giving her hand a gentle squeeze while he still moved the device over her stomach searching for their baby. "There we go, see the head," he said finally, turning the screen more to Mary and pointing at the obvious image.

She smiled and felt her heart beat a little faster. "Mmhm…" She studied the screen hard, trying to see if she could tell the gender from what she saw. She couldn't.

John was having an equally tough time. "Hold on…let me get a better angle."

"Alright." Mary watched her husband reposition the eye against her tummy, trying to locate what they needed to see. "Wait, right there!" Her hand shot up to the screen, pointing to the money shot.

John's eyes moved to the place she was pointing at and he froze his hand. "Oh wow, yeah," he murmured as he made sure of what he saw and swallowing hard before a smile stretched into his lips. "It's a girl."

Mary saw it too and had tears welling up in her eyes almost immediately. "It is a girl…we're going to have a baby girl, John!"

He turned to her with a grin and planted an ecstatic kiss against her lips, quickly snapping a still of the scan. Coming back up, John stared at the screen in awe. "I've got a daughter…" A happy chuckle escaped him, same as the one he had expelled when Sherlock revealed Mary was pregnant at their wedding. He looked away from the screen to see Mary wiping tiny tears off her beaming face. "Are you happy?"

"What do you think?" she laughed, taking a tissue out of the box beside the examining table to tend to her eyes. "I can't wait to hold her."

"Soon," John said, giving her arm a warm rub. He grabbed some tissues as well and cleaned up Mary's belly, making sure all the gel was off before rolling her shirt back down. He printed out two scans, one for each of them, and wasted no time in taping his onto his desk. Prior to actually finding out the sex of his baby, he hadn't thought about whether he would prefer a boy or a girl; but knowing now, he decided the outcome could not have been more perfect. Knowing for sure now that he was going to be the father of a baby girl made John feel as though nothing was more right.

"We'll have to tell Sherlock," Mary proposed, swinging her legs over the table (even though she needed John to pull her back up.) "He's been sending me texts all day about everything under the sun…I think he's hoping I'll mention the sex of the baby without him having to come right out and ask."

"You too?" John laughed, pulling out his phone to read some of the texts he had received from the detective that day. "'The fridge is making a noise,' 'Mrs. Hudson wants to know when you will be home from work today,' 'Bored,' 'On average, how many toothbrush bristles do you lose a week, need to know for a case,' 'Whose that actress with the hook nose that Mary likes?' oh and here's a good one… 'I found an axe under the fridge, yours?'"

Mary giggled. "It's sweet he wants to know."

"Sweet would be asking if we found out the sex yet and then actually having a normal human reaction to it," John said with a look. "My pocket vibrating every ten seconds with increasingly pointless messages is…well, it's Sherlock, I guess."

"Yes, it is." She smiled, rubbing her tummy lovingly. "Why don't you call him and tell him."

"Tell him?"

"That it's a girl, don't tell me you've already forgot!"

He smiled and brought her arms around his neck, kissing her lightly as he entered the embrace. "I haven't forgotten. I just want to share this with my wife for a little while, just us." He rested his hands against her round bump. "Plus, it'll be fun to watch him sweat it out."

She gave him a scolding smirk, but then rolled her eyes. "Fine, make him wait, but not too long!"

"I won't." He smiled and gave her another kiss. "He's coming over tonight to help me with something anyway, we can tell him then."

OOOOO

"This is torture, nothing fits, it doesn't add up! We have to be missing something!" Sherlock yelled, startling Mary who was enjoying a cup of tea two rooms away in her kitchen. She turned an ear in the direction she heard the outburst.

John groaned just as loudly and with the same frustration clenching each word—though his frustration seemed to be directed at Sherlock more so than the problem at hand. "We're not missing anything. You're not looking hard enough!"

Mary chuckled to herself and decided to intervene before things got violent. They had been going back and forth like this for nearly an hour. She grabbed her tea cup and, with some effort, pushed herself out of the kitchen chair.

"John, I can look at the bottom of someone's shoe and tell you where they've been in the past 24 hours and how long they stayed. I can tell you a café's entire breakfast menu just watching customers come out of it. I knew your wife was pregnant before you, her husband and a doctor. I can read someone's hands like a book, find criminal hideouts no one else can, and solve more mysteries in a week than Scotland Yard can even began to build a file for in a year! But _this_ is impossible!"

Mary finally appeared in the doorway of the room where the men sat cross-legged on the floor arguing. "Hey, how's it going?"

"Great." "Perfectly." They answered simultaneously.

"Sounds like you've hit a bump…" she sensitively suggested.

"No," John answered with a nonchalant shake of his head and a 'what gave you that idea' look on his face. Sherlock also shook his head.

Mary glanced down at the pile of cot parts the boys were sitting in, the diagrams and instructions that came with it appeared to have been strewn across the room quite some time ago, and from where she stood, there did not appear to be anything put together yet. "So, uh…where's the baby's cot?"

The men sat silently for a moment and then Sherlock shot up. "Mary, this cot is completely impossible to put together. Might I suggest cleaning out a drawer, laying some blankets in it, and seeing how far that gets you? Children stay pretty much the same size for the first three years, right? Should work."

"Sherlock, we're not putting the baby in a drawer," John quickly shot down, getting up from the floor as well.

"If you hadn't bought a defective cot we wouldn't have to entertain the idea, would we?" he snarkily shot back.

"The cot is not defective; you just refuse to read the directions!"

"Those directions were written by a moron."

"You think everyone's a moron!"

"And that is almost always correct, especially in cases where a person is instructing another person to put together a contraption that has to safely hold a child and fails to say what goes where in nearly every direction and diagram."

"It's all right in front of you, you just have to look! Pretend it's one of your cases."

"I didn't see you attaching any pieces!"

"I could have if you let me read the instructions!"

"Boys!" Mary yelled, throwing her hands up between the bickering men. They both shut up, but continued to stare each other down. "You're not going to get anywhere yelling at each other. So, if you can't do this then I guess I'll have to."

She determinedly waddled over to the pile of parts and, holding her stomach for support, lowered herself to the floor. Sherlock and John quickly went over to her, scolding each other and feeling pretty guilty themselves. "No, Mary," John pleaded, taking her hand to pull her back up. "You've been on your feet all day and you aren't supposed to be doing anything remotely strenuous. Let us do it."

"No, you two can't get along and I don't want our child to be sleeping in a drawer, so I'm doing it." She stubbornly went to work, looking for something to connect the piece she currently held in her hand.

"Mary," Sherlock began, coming over to her other side. "I recently read that sitting on the floor this close to your due date can induce early labor."

"That's not true," she replied dismissively, grabbing for the instructions which were unfortunately out of her reach.

"Darling," John said with a grunt as he squatted down next to her. "I promise he and I will stop bickering and put this thing together—"

"How can you promise that?" Sherlock chimed in.

"Because we're going to use the bloody directions," John firmly answered back. He returned his attention to his wife. "Just leave it to us, it'll be fine. You know you can't sit here and do this very long, and if you have to keep getting up to stretch you'll be exhausted."

Mary gave each of them a hard look, but nodded in compliance anyway. "Fine, but only because I can't really breathe in this position," she said, holding the place where her uterus was pushing into her diaphragm.

"Sherlock, help me get her up. Now."

They each took an arm and lifted her back up, all three concealing their heavy breathing when the process was over. "Thanks," she said, patting the two of them. "And I'm sorry I yelled at you…" neither appeared to be to offended by the disciplinary action, but a confused look came over Sherlock's face when he noticed Mary's lip begin to quiver and her eyes redden. "It means so much that you're here helping, Sherlock, really it does." She wrapped him in a tight hug, befuddling him further.

'Mood swing,' John mouthed to him from behind Mary. Sherlock nodded, understanding best he could.

"It's no trouble," he told her, patting her back. "Don't want it sleeping in a drawer, do we?"

Mary pulled back and wiped her eyes a bit. "Oh, um, actually we don't need to say 'it' anymore." She rejoined John, grabbing his hand with a smile. "We found out the sex today."

"Ah." Sherlock interlocked his hands coolly behind his back. "William Sherlock Scott Holmes."

"What?" Mary raised a humored brow.

"That's the whole of it…in case you haven't decided on a name yet."

John smiled and wrapped his arm around Mary. "Uh no, Sherlock we're not naming our daughter after you."

Sherlock smiled at the two, genuinely smiled. "It's a girl, then?"

"Yes!" Mary told him brightly, reaching for her stomach. "It's a girl.

"Congratulations." He nodded in their direction with another small smile. "Maybe I should have gotten the mobile in a different color…something with…ponies?"

The Watsons gave him a look and shook their heads with a chuckled. "No, Sherlock, the mobile is perfect," Mary reassured him. "And when this cot gets put together it'll be the first thing to go in it."

"Excellent," the detective said, and then he glanced down at the crib clutter. "We'd better get to work then."

It was nearly ten o'clock when the cot was finished, and to everyone's surprise it was actually done correctly. There were no extraneous parts that never found their way in, no crooked beams, no stuck wheels, and the mobile looked lovely hanging over the cotton-candy-colored bedding. "Well that wasn't so hard," Sherlock stated contently, returning some of John's tools to the tiny shoe box he kept them in.

John nodded in agreement. "Looks good, I'd say." He scanned the rest of the nursery. So far, the cot was finished and placed on the east wall by a rocking chair Mrs. Hudson had given Mary, there was a wardrobe on the opposite side of the room, and the chest in which John had been keeping the baby clothes that he and Mary had bought or been given by excited friends was positioned by the window on the adjacent wall. "We still got a lot of work to do in here…Christ, why'd I wait so long."

"Because you were holding a grudge against your wife," Sherlock answered obviously, not noticing the sideways look he received from John.

"Yeah, thanks mate." He turned off the dim lamplight and headed out to the kitchen, Sherlock following close behind. When they reached the kitchen, John pulled a water bottle out of the fridge and attempted to change the subject. "So, did you still want to take a ride over to that widow's house tomorrow?"

"Widow?"

"Yeah, the one that emailed you about her missing cat."

"Oh that one, no. Can't. I have to go see Mycroft tomorrow about the Moriar—"

"Shh!" John urgently stopped him and then held up his finger, listening to the silence in the flat for a moment.

Sherlock's brows sloped down in confusion. "John, what are you—"

"Just shut up for a second!" he reiterated in the same exaggerated whisper. He listened for a couple more seconds and then took his finger down. Still speaking in a hushed tone, John abashedly admitted, "I haven't told Mary about the Moriarty video Mycroft received a few days after the Magnusson thing."

"What do you mean you haven't told her? How could you not tell her?"

"Because, she only has a few more weeks to go and so far she's been great with keeping her blood pressure down. I don't want to take any chances, not now. And she's going to be stressed out as it is the closer we get to her due date. So, I didn't think it too smart to tell my nearly nine months pregnant wife that the biggest criminal mastermind London has ever seen who had an unnatural obsession with you has somehow resurrected himself. She can finally relax about Magnusson; I don't want her to have to worry about Moriarty now of all times. Especially since, if you remember, he's the guy that actually acts on the information he gets and doesn't give a shit about the lives he takes in the process. That's why I didn't tell her."

Sherlock stayed silent, studying the man in front of him who was now visibly disturbed by the thought of Moriarty being back. "Well, I suggest you tell her, and soon. That video is going to be leaked to the public. Probably within the next two weeks."

"What?!" John's eye practically jumped off his face. "How? Mycroft can't let that happen!"

"Let it happen?" Sherlock bemused. "He's orchestrating it."

Now John had to lean against the counter for support. "Sorry?" he said, trying to remain calm and not strangle the messenger.

The detective sighed and tactfully eyed his friend, trying to decide what his next statement would be. "John, I'm going to tell you something and I need you to be level-headed. None of that 'I'm about to be a father and I'm a nervous wreck over it' anxiety, please."

"I've not been a nervous wreck."

"You check Mary's pulse when she's sleeping."

"How'd you know about that?"

"I catch you sneaking checks on it every hour, why shouldn't I assume you also do it when she's asleep."

"Yeah, alright, just say what you need to say," John forfeited, not wanting to entertain his friend any longer.

"You'll stay calm?"

"I'll do my best impression of calm." He was almost positive what Sherlock was about to say would not leave him calm at all.

"The Moriarty video is not real…it was manufactured," Sherlock revealed, watching for the twitches in John's face to signal his outrage level.

John didn't react though, he appeared to be mulling over the information he had just been given. "Manufactured?" Sherlock nodded. "By whom?"

"Someone we know…and for a reason that isn't what you think."

"Why can't you just come out with it? Stop giving me these little taglines. What's going on, Sherlock?"

"Molly made the video," the taller man blurted finally. "She made the video and sent it to Mycroft in order to convince the powers that be to terminate my sentence for killing Magnusson. I asked her to do it, and if anyone finds out about that, I will take full responsibility. Mycroft is aware that it is a fake and is onboard to use it to diffuse the sentence."

"Well…" John purled to himself. "Holy shit."

"I know you're probably upset that once again I went to Molly instead of you, but it was necessary. I couldn't drag you into this, not with Mary being so close to the Magnusson case. The trail would easily lead back to you and who knows what secrets could be spilled about her."

"Sherlock, I'm not mad you had help from Molly…" John said, realizing that Sherlock wasn't seeing the big picture. "You're committing another crime here…a huge one. What happens when everyone realizes that Moriarty is still dead? He is…still dead, right?"

"Of course he is, you can't fake shooting yourself in the face." Sherlock scoffed to himself and took a seat at the kitchen counter. "And Mycroft's already taken care of those details. Tomorrow he's going to go through the finalized plan with me."

John was silent for a long time, trying to wrap his head around all of it, though he was so tired at this point it really wasn't happening for him. He sighed and finally spoke. "Are you sure you have this figured out? You're going to be okay doing this?"

"Yes." Sherlock was confident in his answer and John knew that he couldn't say anymore. The Holmes brothers had put a plan into action and attempting to stop them or even fact check them was futile.

"Alright…I'll let Mary know what's happening."


	11. Chapter 11

After Sherlock had headed home, John moseyed into the bedroom where he found Mary sitting up in bed flipping through one boring channel after another. She had a bowl of trail mix sitting on top of her stomach that she was picking through for the chocolate pieces and about a dozen candy wrappers on the bedside table next to her. He had to smile. "What are you watching?"

"Absolutely nothing," she replied, disappointedly turning off the telly. "Nothing is even remotely worth watching."

John lay down next to her and brought a loving hand to her bump, rubbing gently back and forth. He did this nearly every night. "How are you feeling?"

"My ankles are swollen, my back is killing me, I'm big as a house, and your daughter has somehow managed to push against my lungs and my bladder at the same time," Mary answered truthfully, picking out the last chocolate chip in her trail mix and moving the bowl to the nightstand with the other remnants of her late night cravings. "So, basically great."

"Sorry, love." John smiled sympathetically and pulled the covers up a bit. When he did, he felt something crinkly by his leg. "What's that?"

"What? Oh, that," she responded, reaching under the sheets to grab what he had just nudged at. "I forgot about those…"

"Maltesers?" John asked with an amused look.

"Well they were," Mary confirmed, crunching up the empty bag and tossing it into the waste basket by the bed. "Don't blame me, she likes chocolate."

"And just about everything else in the kitchen," he playfully quipped.

Mary's jaw fell in mock-offense. "I can't believe you would insult a pregnant lady! Are you forgetting who did this?" she asked, pointing to her belly.

"Hmm, might be," he said, curling his lip as he pretended to ponder. "You may need to remind me how it happened."

"John!" Mary exclaimed in giggles as he began a trail of kisses down her neckline. She made a few attempts to discourage her mischievous husband, but truly did not want him to stop. John's hands wrapped themselves around her waist, and the deeper he kissed, the further back her head fell in satisfaction. Though Mary's stomach presented a minor hindrance, it didn't take long for the two to become immersed in the physical bliss of each other.

One would think that after such a charged and exhausting activity, a person who was already constantly tired would be able to fall asleep without a problem; at least this was Mary's thought as she sat up awake watching the glowing numbers on the nightstand clock turn 12:00 am. She just couldn't get comfortable which was not unusual these days, but tonight it was particularly challenging. Laying flat on her back was out of the question, and lying on one side made it too difficult for her to flip to the other when the first side went numb. She had tried several times to rearrange the pillows to elevate her top half (her normal sleeping position), but no matter what she did or how she placed herself some part of her was not pleased. Not to mention, the baby was kicking nonstop.

She decided to run through her list of baby names, her favorite pastime when sleep wasn't coming easily. However, just as she was starting to relax a bit, the sound of frantic muffled whispers pulled her away from her mental list.

She glanced down and saw that John's face, which was so peaceful a moment ago, had contorted into his nightmarish expression. It happened every now and then, and it came with the territory of being married to a soldier. Usually his hands would twitch for a bit and then the bad dream would pass after a little while, but for him to be audibly muttering and even beginning to writhe under the blankets, Mary knew this was a bad one. She tried to make out the words, but they proved to be far from coherent.

"Ughfm…no, that's…sto—ugh,ugh no—wai—nuh, no!" His yell made her jump and release her own quiet shriek.

"John," she called, shaking his shoulder to pull him out of whatever he was dreaming. "Honey, wake up…John." His eyes finally shot open as wide, white orbs in the darkened room, and it took him just under a second to realize he had woken up. Mary rubbed his arm comfortingly to be sure he was actually awake. "Honey?"

A little embarrassed, John immediately figured he must have woken her up and swallowed hard in an attempt to get his breathing under control. "Oh jeez, Mary I'm sorry, I was—"

"Shh, it's alright," she reassured him, still rubbing at his shoulder. She watched as his heavy exhalations calmed down and his eyes adjusted to the bedroom (since that was clearly not where he was a second ago.) "You okay?"

He brushed it off with a nod and wiped the tiny beads of sweat on his forehead. "Yeah, yeah." He attempted as his fingers gave her arm a light rub, and he gently kissed her hand to reassure her. "Go back to sleep."

"I wasn't sleeping," she told him with a frustrated sigh. "Can't get comfortable."

"Oh, well here…" he pushed himself up from the mattress, trying to overcome the drowsiness, and leaned back against the headboard. "Come here." Mary smiled and nestled herself into his open-arms, snuggling into a position that actually felt good for the time being. John wrapped her up and let his hands fall carelessly onto her stomach. "How's this?"

"Actually, this works…certainly doesn't make me want to rip out my hair," she said, resting her head heavy against his chest. "Your heart's still going a mile a minute. Must have been a bad one…you're sure you're alright?"

He leaned down and kissed the top of her head, thankful she couldn't see his face. "Course I am, just an exciting dream, that's all."

"Exciting?"

"Mmhm."

Debating for a moment or two whether or not she should push the subject, Mary pulled her lip between her teeth and glanced subtly down at the hands on her middle. She supposed it couldn't hurt to ask. "What were you dreaming about?"

"What?" John hadn't expected her to inquire; she never did before.

"You said it was exciting…"

His jaw tightened a bit at the request, and he tried to sneak a peek at Mary's expression, but with her head on his chest he couldn't see it. He knew it was no use saying this, but he gave it a go anyway. "I don't, uh…I don't really want to talk about it."

"Well, maybe you should," Mary predictably followed up. She was not one to accept evasions so easily. "You were yelling, John, I mean, that sounds like—"

"Mary," he cut her off, "I'm fine, really."

She was quiet for a while, a respectful amount of time. She didn't want to push him, nor did she have the energy to lift herself off of her husband if that's what had to be done. "John…" she finally said, and her voice sounded so smooth as it cut through the silence. "Can I confess something?"

He curiously eyed her profile, but stayed leaned up against the headboard. "Yeah."

"I've been having dreams too, nightmares really. I didn't want to tell you about them because I feel silly for even thinking about it so much, but I can't help it." It was true, she'd been experiencing nightmares for a couple weeks now; always the same one. John rushed her to the hospital because her water broke and _always, always, always_ something went wrong. In the least traumatic dreams, they got a flat on the highway. In the worst dreams, complications during the labor ended up—well, she didn't want to think about that at all. She couldn't, she'd start crying. She could hardly control it these days. "I've been dreaming about the day she finally comes," Mary opted, patting her stomach through her t-shirt. "And things don't go as planned." She was hoping that if she opened up about hers, John would feel less embarrassed to say what had been keeping him on edge during the night.

"Oh," John spoke softly, sympathetically rubbing her arms up and down. "You know that's not going to happen… You're going to be fine."

"Well, I hope so…but it's hard to shake." She felt the quiver rising in her throat and she wondered if she should just abandon the topic. What was meant to get John talking was beginning to play with her own nerves. She could feel the anxiety in her stomach twitch against her, and some small tears begin to warm the back of her eyes. But she just kept on talking… she hadn't realized until now just how much she wanted to get it out. "I guess I just can't shake the feeling that I'm going to be… punished..."

"Mary, stop it." He could see where this was going and didn't want her to send herself into a fit.

"Is it such a crazy thought?" she instantly posed, with a tremor in her words.

John didn't know what to say. Of course it was a crazy thought! But that wouldn't be enough. He took a moment, waiting for her breathing to relax a bit and sneakily ran a finger over her wrist for her heart rate (and then immediately cursed Sherlock's annoying 'told you so' voice in his head.) "I can't tell you what's going to happen…" he started in a gentle tone when he felt she was ready to listen. "But I do know this: there is nothing either or us wouldn't do to protect each other and to protect this little one." Lovingly, his hand caressed her tummy which he saw brought a tiny smile to her lips. "You won't be punished, Mary. You know better than to think that way."

Abashedly, she nodded at that. "Here I was trying to comfort you…"

"And you've done brilliantly," he sarcastically replied, earning a scolding smirk from his wife. John smiled and gave her arm a reassuring squeeze. "I told you, I'm fine…and so is everything else. There's nothing to worry about."

Mary knew John had successfully evaded her brief interrogation; even if it was mostly her fault for letting her hormone-injected emotions sidetrack her intentions. But what could she do now? Not much. Especially since the soft sound of his heart thumping low under his t-shirt was beginning to lull her to sleep. "Fine," she murmured groggily. "We can talk about it tomorrow."

"Alright," he replied, hoping she'd forget. He took a deep breath in an attempt to calm his own nerves. "Night, love."

"Night," she whispered, and then surrendered to sleep. John was stunned at how quickly she was out, and guessed that he'd better get used to this upright position. With as little movement as possible, so as not to wake the pregnant lady, he wedged a pillow between his back and the wooden headboard—though he knew he would probably be just as achy tomorrow morning. It was a small price to pay, he decided, since "achy" had become Mary's norm. She was carrying his child, the least he could do was share in some of the pain. When he reset his hands onto her big belly, he was almost immediately met with a kick from his daughter, and then a second, and then a third. 'No wonder she can't fall asleep,' he thought to himself. 'You're kicking her all night.' He didn't dare move his hands away though; he loved feeling his baby move, especially now that he was so close to meeting her. And in that moment, however brief a time, he was able to forget the horrors of his nightmare and felt like everything actually would be okay.

The next morning, however, he paid for it. His neck, back, shoulders, and chest were screaming at him for sleeping like that all night. Mary was already up it seemed, and he could hear her fumbling around in the kitchen. He groaned through gritted teeth as he slowly removed himself from the bed, trying to massage some of his revolting muscles in the process. It didn't work.

"Morning honey," Mary greeted cheerfully when her disheveled husband trudged into the kitchen, eyes squinty and neck crooked. "You look great."

He gave a sarcastic smile in return and sat down at the table. "I didn't even hear you get up."

"I was trying to be quiet…" she replied, pulling a tea cup out of the cabinet and placing it in front of him. "Didn't seem like you slept well last night." The words came out gently, but they were an obvious invitation to a discussion. The same one Mary had bungled the night before. "You were still tossing after we went back to sleep."

A bit of embarrassment contorted John's pursed lips, but he swiftly concealed it with a smile. "Just a bad night, I guess." He even made his eyes appear a little brighter to enhance the effect of the smile. "I'm fine." She sat down across from him, passing a cuppa his way, visibly unconvinced that he was 'fine.' "Thanks love," he said appreciatively, taking the first sip.

Mary smiled and wrapped her fingers around her own mug, deciding to address the issue now before he could change the subject. "John," she started sternly. "I know, emotionally, I've been a little…all over the place lately, but if there's something bothering you then tell me. Don't keep it all bottled up."

John sighed heavily and set down his tea, searching for the best words. "Alright," he softly began, looking into his lap before meeting her eyes. "There was something bothering me."

When he didn't speak for a second or two, Mary couldn't help but nudge him a bit, giving away her eagerness to know what her husband was going through. "I'm listening."

He nodded. "It's not a huge deal, the usual stuff…it was Afghanistan again." Mary brows sloped into a simultaneously empathetic and confused position. He had Afghanistan dreams here and there, and she could always tell….last night was much more dramatic. But John kept on talking, so she kept on listening. There wasn't time to second guess. "Yesterday I ran into an old friend. Brian Heller, you remember I told you about him? Young guy, he was in my unit with his brother. Well, his brother didn't make it back home."

"Darling, I'm so sorry," she said sadly, reaching warmly for his hand across the table and giving it a comforting squeeze.

John nodded appreciatively again with a small smile. "It's alright; it was a long time ago. But I guess seeing him made the usual dreams a tad more real. I promise it's nothing that hasn't happened before. I've already forgotten about it to tell you the truth. Don't worry."

John was called into the clinic just a few minutes later, so he couldn't stay much longer to chat about the nightmare, which seemed especially fine with him. He kissed Mary goodbye, as well as the baby the way he did every time he left, and made her promise not to go into labor while he was gone. And then he was off.

Mary almost immediately picked up her phone the second his car drove away. "Hello Sherlock," she said after a couple rings. "Can you come over?...No, I'm not in labor….John lied to me….Thanks."

The detective didn't take long at all, arriving at the door in just under ten minutes. "Here you go," he greeted, pushing a brown paper bag into Mary's arms as he walked into the flat.

"What's this?"

"It's from Mrs. Hudson," he responded dully, clearly uninterested in the contents of the bag. "Muffins, I think."

"Mmm, blueberry," she practically moaned when she opened the bag and the heavenly aroma was released. "Would you like one?"

Sherlock turned back around to see her already putting one for herself on a plate, not wasting any time. "No, thank you."

"Suit yourself." She grabbed a bottle of ketchup from the fridge and waddled over to where he sat on the couch with the plate in one hand and the odd condiment in the other. Sherlock had to smirk when he saw her happily squirt the ketchup onto the plate and liberally dip a piece of muffin into it. Her cravings fascinated him. "Stop with the face, I'm _very_ pregnant."

"You're not anymore pregnant today than you were yesterday."

"That's where you're wrong."

"You've gained two pounds this week, but other than that everything else is the same."

She frowned at him, slowly chewing her treat, and a tad less excited than she was a moment ago."It's only one pound this week."

"Two," he insisted. "John confirmed it."

She glared at her friend. "Did he now?"

"Yes, and while we're on the subject, what'd he lie about?"

Mary regained her focus and set the plate down on the coffee table. "Right. He was tossing and turning all night. He says he was having dreams about army stuff, but it wasn't. He mentioned seeing Brian Heller yesterday and said that may have triggered it, but I know he didn't."

"How do you know?"

"I know when John's lying," she answered, not feeling she needed to offer further explanation.

" _How_ do you know?" Sherlock repeated.

"I just do, he's my husband. Besides, can't you tell when he's lying?"

"Yes, but I wasn't here to see him lie."

"Well then you'll just have to take my word for it."

"No I don't, I know he's lying."

Mary rolled her eyes. "If you didn't see him lie, how do you know?"

"It's not about what I didn't see, it's what I did see," he replied, trying to sound clever.

"Okay," Mary said, drawing out the word as she reluctantly played along. "What did you see?"

"Brian Heller," Sherlock answered, pausing for Mary's surprised look. "He was sitting in one of Lestrade's cells."

"He got arrested?!"

"Two nights ago for drunk driving. Lestrade was only keeping him 24 hours. So unless John also got arrested last night, then he didn't see Brian Heller."

Mary sunk deeper into the couch. "Then why is he lying?"

"Easy, you've got two weeks until your due date," Sherlock said with a shrug, grabbing a piece of ketchupped blueberry muffin. "Since your both medical professionals, I'm sure you're well aware that once a woman has two weeks to go then she could pretty much give birth any day. So, he's freaking out about it. He's always been theatrical like that." Proud of his effortless deduction, Sherlock tossed the muffin into his mouth.

Mary watched the look of disgusted realization come over him as he tasted the blueberry and ketchup come together. "Not a fan then?"

After a painstaking swallow, he stoically turned to her. "You're insane."

Mary just moved right along though. "I know he's nervous about the baby, I am too. But why the secrets? Why not just tell me? After everything we've been through the last few months, surely this must be an easier thing to tackle than…well, you know, the other thing."

Sherlock shrugged a shoulder and sat quietly, until he realized Mary was waiting for him to speak. "Oh come on, you don't really expect me to know, do you?"

She gave him a sideways glance and went back to her muffin. "You know more about human emotions then you let on."

"That's your department."

She pondered for a while, not sure if it was even worth pursuing. "I just wish he would talk to me about it. I don't want him to be all uptight. You know how he gets." Sherlock nodded, he was quite familiar with what a stressed out John Watson looked like. "Maybe you could—"

"No."

"—talk to him." Mary's face fell. "Why not?"

"Because I'm not his therapist."

"No, you're his friend, his best friend, and sometimes that means wearing different hats." She felt a hearty kick against her belly and automatically covered the spot with her hand. "Please, Sherlock. He's not going to talk to me about it, probably because he doesn't want me stressing out. He needs to let it all out to someone."

Sherlock grumbled, but Mary knew what that meant. "You know, I _used_ to be a detective."

"You can take one day off," she smiled appreciatively. "It'll just be a chat. Give him a chance to get it all off his chest. Oh, and Sherlock, try to be discreet. John won't want to talk about what's bothering him if he knows I'm going to hear about it."

OOOOO

"Tell me what's bothering you so I can tell your wife," Sherlock blatantly delivered sitting across from John at the breakfast table.

"Excuse me?"

"Or at least give me _something_ I can relay to Mary." In his hand, Sherlock casually held a malodorous, steaming test tube that John had been eyeing suspiciously throughout breakfast.

"What did Mary say to you?"

Sherlock sighed, wishing John would just answer the question so he could get back to his experiment. "She told me how you've been especially stressed lately about the imminent birth of your child, and since you won't talk to her she wants you to vent to me."

"Are you serious?" He sounded annoyed, an opportunity Sherlock decided to seize.

"Yep, irritating, isn't it?" The detective adjusted his safety goggles on his nose. "I propose that since you obviously have no reason or need to vent, and since you know your wife much better than anyone else, you tell me something that she would believe you said. I can tell her, and she'll likely not ask again."

"I can't believe she wants you to spy on me." John reiterated, folding offended arms across his chest. "Or that I would need to air out my emotions. Especially to you! You've got about as much empathy for others as burned toast."

"That's what I said!" Sherlock agreed with enthusiasm, nearly spilling his concoction

"And so what if I am stressing out… I'm about to be a _father_ for Christ sake! I think that's a very understandable reason to stress out."

"Oh no," Sherlock muttered in droned realization.

"And she can't possibly be perfectly calm about becoming a mother," John continued, not noticing Sherlock roll his eyes and begrudgingly set his test tube into its rack. "Although, she'll probably be perfect at it…she can do stuff like that. Be warm, and nurturing. I chase after criminals with a guy who thinks of a triple homicide as Christmas. How the hell am I going to do this?!"

"To start, you can stop whining."

"Oh, what do you know?" John huffed and looked up at Sherlock. "And when exactly did it become okay for you to move your experiments to my house? Isn't that what Baker Street is for?"

"Among other things, yes. But I was out of tea, Mrs. Hudson was out of town, so…"

"So you had no one to cook for you." Sherlock shrugged affirmatively and John groaned loudly. "Oh well that's just great, look, I'm already rubbish."

"What are you talking about now?"

"You might as well be a six year old when it comes to getting what you want. You act like an arse and still I let you drag me all over the place. How am I ever going to be a parent? If I can't say no to you, there's no way I'll be able to say it to my daughter."

"Lucky for you, she won't even understand words for the first few months."

"Ughh," John dropped his head onto his hands. "How the hell am I going to do this? Seriously, how?"

"You'll do it, and you'll do it well."

"How do you know?"

"I don't, I'm making an inference."

John waited, positive his friend would say more. "What, there's no deduction recitation for this?"

Sherlock cocked his head to the side with refined sass. "Do you remember the speech I gave at your wedding?"

"Course I do."

"And have you ever known me to go out of my way to make people feel good about themselves or to boost others' self-esteem with pretty exaggerations of qualities they _may_ , on a good day, possess?"

John knowingly looked into his palms. "No."

"Well then why are you asking me how you'll be as a father? I said you were a great man. Surely a great man wouldn't find it too difficult to be a great father as well."

The doctor was quiet for a while, as all of his nervous, flattered, and supremely uncertain parts battled for space inside his head. "Thank you, Sherlock," he said genuinely, smiling at his friend.

"You're welcome."

"You know what's been hardest to cope with? It's having to worry about Mary and the baby and everything going okay, and not be able to know everything will be fine until our daughter is in our arms; but also knowing that the second she's born is when the real worrying begins."

Surprisingly, Sherlock knew what he meant. He couldn't even count the number of times he had been on a case and the danger of the investigation felt like a prequel, only matched in risk by the aftermath of finding the solution. "Why can't you tell Mary this?" he asked, studying his friend's fidgeting fingers.

"She's nervous about something happening before or during labor, something going wrong, I mean. And the more stressed she is, the higher the chance is that things could become complicated."

"Mary's strong, John, extremely strong. It's probably just as agitating for you to not tell her. Not telling her is only going to make her imagination run wild about all the things you _could_ be stressing about. And she'll end up with all new fears she's not thought of yet."

"Yeah, you're probably right about that one." He never felt good saying those words. "Maybe I can talk to her later tonight."

Sherlock furrowed his brow. "Wait a minute, she was here, wasn't she?"

"An hour ago, mate. She left with Molly to go baby shopping." John watched the blankness of his friend's face thicken. "Remember, she said bye to you…you waved."

"Was that why I waved?"

"It was, yeah."

"Huh…"

That night, Sherlock was back at Baker Street, still playing around with chemicals and test tubes which were now set up at his own kitchen table. The lights were dim, and down enough to lessen the effect of a text that came through and lit up the room. Mary's picture appeared on the screen.

 _Thank you_ , was all it said. Sherlock smiled to himself and set the phone back down, returning to his unfinished work.

OOOOO

Thanks for reading! Hope everyone's Christmas shopping is off to a good start!


	12. Chapter 12

"Why do they do that?" Sherlock wondered aloud as he gazed down at Baker Street through a thin opening where his fingers parted the curtain.

"Who?" John responded, not looking up from his blog.

"Them. The clients." He dropped the drape and plopped down on the couch. "They get a sandwich next door before they come here, as if to make it seem like they weren't actually in _need_ of a detective, rather just 'in the neighborhood.' It's annoying."

"It's human nature."

"Hardly a good excuse."

John sighed and pulled his eyes away from his computer screen. "People don't want other people knowing they need help. It's a primal instinct. Hide weaknesses, no matter how small."

Sherlock's head snapped in John's direction. "Interesting."

"What is?"

"Your explanation."

"No," the other man said, already knowing what was coming. "It just makes sense."

"You're transposing your situation onto other people so you won't feel insecure." Sherlock paused for a second and then shook his head. "On second thought, it's really not that interesting."

John grumbled and closed the laptop. "I'm not insecure."

"Really?"

"Really."

"So, it's not at all bothering you that your wife sent you over here because your obsessive worrying was driving her nuts?"

"She didn't send me over here, I chose to come over. And you asked me to," he added enthusiastically, glad he remembered that bit.

"I asked you to last week."

"Well, I couldn't come last week."

"No, you're suggesting that Mary, being who she is, sees needing help as a weakness. So, when you constantly try to help her do things, it aggravates her. Applying this logic, it makes perfect sense that the reason you're here and not there with your pregnant wife who could pop any day now is not through any fault of your own, i.e, being annoying, but through Mary's primal instinct to hide weakness. Am I wrong?"

"Yes, you are. And don't refer to my wife as 'popping.'"

"Insecure," Sherlock repeated, ignoring John's objections.

"Why don't you go back to watching people eat outside," John offered with an annoyed roll of his eyes as he returned to his laptop.

"I'll do one better." Sherlock briskly vaulted off the sofa and threw on his jacket. "I'll solve their case. Based on the disposition and excessive appetite, it's nothing major… I bet I can do it in seven minutes. Time me."

Before John could say 'no,' Sherlock had evacuated the flat. The doctor huffed and leaned back in his chair, pondering over something his friend had said somewhere in all his narcissistic nonsense. The corner of his mouth turned up in reluctant uncertainty the way it did when he bit against his cheek. John cursed himself for doing it, but pulled out the phone anyway.

"Hi hun," Mary answered after a few rings. "How's your day with Sherlock going?"

"Fine, I guess. He's bored." John got up to look out the window, finding Sherlock down below. "He actually went _out_ to a client."

"You're kidding," Mary lightly gasped, leaning up against their kitchen counter when standing became too exhausting.

"Only down the stairs," John added, watching Sherlock and the would-be client outside. "Still."

"Well, find him a case, would you?" she gently requested, resting the hand not grasping the phone on her stomach. "Because who knows how many they'll be time for when the baby comes…for Sherlock too. If he thinks he's getting out of changing nappies and washing—"

"Yeah, he knows," John said with a smile, but then paused, his uncertainty from before reappearing on his face. "So, is that the only reason you wanted me to spend the day over here?"

"What?" She sounded caught off guard, and she was.

"I mean, to run him a bit. Like you did before the wedding. You know, show him that our baby will not be the end of his detective career…or mine, I guess." John wasn't worried about what having a baby would mean for their days of crime-fighting, he knew they would still get to go on their ridiculous adventures. Besides, having his baby girl to come home to gave him a much more profound reason to rid the streets of as many baddies as possible—and this was easier to explain than was his abnormal addiction to danger. "I'm only asking because, well…"

"John?" Mary said into the phone when the silence hung for an extra long time on the other line.

He exhaled sharply, feeling sufficiently stupid. "Am I bugging you?"

She raised a guilty brow and bit her lip. "Bugging me?"

"Yeah, you're two weeks away from your due date and maybe that's made me extra doctor-y…" Mary could tell his nerves were getting to him by how fast he was talking. "So Sherlock says you just had me come over here to get me out of the house where I can't bug you. If that's true, just tell me and I'll try to knock it off. If it's not, tell me so I can call him a cock."

"Well that was boring," Sherlock announced, suddenly appearing in the doorway with blood gushing from his nose all over his shirt.

"What the…"

"What happened?" Mary asked, having heard Sherlock's voice.

"He's gotten himself punched in the face, what else is new," John reported with a scolding look at his friend.

"I think I heard a crack when he hit me," Sherlock muddled, twitching his nose to check. "Doesn't feel broken…"

"You better have a look at it," Mary suggested, taking a container of grapes out of the fridge. "Could be a break."

"Fine." John knew he would have to anyway. "I'll be home soon, depending on how much Sherlock pissed this guy off."

"Girl," Sherlock corrected, his head raised in the air to slow the bleeding.

"What?"

"It was a woman."

"I think you have your hands full. I'll see you later. Bye honey," Mary said with a chuckle.

"Bye." John hung up and turned back around to Sherlock, beginning to assess the damage. "Two minutes, by the way."

"What?"

"That's how long it took you to go outside, speak to someone, and have her punch you in the face." John smugly told him.

"Ughhhh," Mary groaned loudly and out of nowhere…for the third time that morning.

John, who was sitting up in bed with his arms innocently folded and legs outstretched , just looked up to the ceiling in a desperate attempt to not make eye contact with his wife—just in case there was anything about his gaze that could be construed (to a nine months pregnant woman) as combative. "It was supposed to happen already!" Mary yelled from the bathroom. "Yesterday, it was supposed to happen yesterday!"

Taking his life in his hands, he sheepishly craned his neck to look into the bathroom and offered Mary some comforting words. "You know, it's very common for first-time pregnancies to be overdue."

All the rummaging and huffing and puffing in the adjoining bathroom stopped immediately and Mary appeared in the doorway. "Seriously?"

'Oh no,' John internally panicked.

"Is that supposed to be consoling?"

"Mary, I'm just—"

"I know! You're just trying to help, but telling me that feeling this way shouldn't be so bad because lots of other women have felt this way before isn't helpful!" Her angry expression held for a moment or two and then seemed to melt right off her face as mood swing number two stepped up to the plate. "John, I'm sorry," she apologized in a whimper, coming over to the bed and to sit down by his feet. "It's not fair!"

He got up and managed to wrap an arm around her without causing too much of a stir. "It's alright. You're pregnant; you're allowed to be a bit barmy. And it's my baby in there, so if most of that craziness is directed toward me, then I guess I deserve it."

She moaned into her hands and hung her head in exhaustion. "I'm so sick of being pregnant."

"Well, I'm also a little sick of you being pregnant," he half-joked, hoping to get a chuckle out of her.

"I've peed ten times this morning. It's not even 9 o'clock! I can't remember what my ankles looked like before they were the size of bricks, or what it felt like to actually be able to see them without having to lean over this giant watermelon stomach. I want to give birth!"

"You will," John reassured her, putting a gentle hand on her belly. "But it'll happen when she's ready."

Mary just hung her head and groaned again. Then, an idea snapped it back up. "Let's have sex."

"What?" John blurted with a laugh, taken aback.

"Sex is the best way to induce labor," she replied, despite knowing John was already aware of this.

As tempting as that was, John shook his head. "Mary no, it'll happen when it happens." He stood up and kissed her forehead. "You have to relax."

"Not possible."

"I'll go put some tea on, alright." He smiled at her, hoping she would too, but she didn't. John knew how anxious and frustrated she was, but inducing labor was not something he was ready to do. He hated to admit it, but as excited as he was to be a father, he was a nervous wreck. He needed more time, and luckily his daughter seemed to be on his side.

While the kettle bubbled, John sifted through some mail cluttering up the counter. One envelope in particular caught his eye, well the return address did. It was from Harry. Surprised, but pleased to read to see what his sister had sent him, he tore it open. It was a postcard with a palm tree in on it and "Florida" jotted across it in brush script font. Maybe her traveling meant she was finding new, less destructive ways to fill the void in her life. "Harry sent me a postcard," he yelled to Mary who was still in the bedroom searching for something to wear that actually still fit. "She's in Florida."

"Well good for her," Mary yelled back with sarcasm drenching every syllable. "Maybe if I jump for joy this baby will come out of me!"

Mentally kicking himself for walking right into that one, John tossed the postcard back down and got Mary's favorite tea cup out of the cabinet. "Here you g—" When he came back into the bedroom holding the two mugs in his hand, his wife was nowhere to be found. "Mary?"

"In here!" she yelled from the toilet. "Peeing again, big surprise there."

Thankfully the door was mostly closed, so Mary couldn't see just how apprehensive her husband became with every passing mood swing. Walking on eggshells was not something that got easier over time. John set both mugs down on the night stand and grabbed his phone off the bureau. _Please tell me you aren't doing anything today_ , he frantically texted Sherlock.

 _Why?_ he received back almost immediately.

'Thank god,' the doctor cheered in his head. Sherlock was not busy. He dialed the familiar number and waiting for his friend to pick up, which he did eventually. "Sherlock, I need a favor," he explained instantly, forgoing any useless pleasantries.

Sherlock furrowed his brows and continued throwing darts at the couch. "What?"

"Mary is going mad over here, and I have to be at the clinic at eleven. I don't want to leave her alone. Could you hang out with her for a little while?"

"You want me to babysit your wife? She's a trained special agent…and a grown woman. You realize that? And why are you whispering?"

John rolled his eyes and leaned his forehead tiredly up against the wall. "No, I don't need you to babysit her. I just think she'd like to get out of the house. She's going stir-crazy. Not to mention she's nine months pregnant, it would be nice if someone was with her just in case something happens."

"Wait a minute." Something had just occurred to him for the first time. "Her due date was yesterday."

"Yeah, I know." John whispered back as he checked the bathroom door to make sure it was still closed.

"So why aren't you parents yet?"

"She's late. It's common. Can you do it?"

"Well what's the point of a due date if it doesn't mean anything?"

"Sherlock, focus!" John interjected, getting him back on track. "Can Mary stay at Baker Street with you? I'll only be at the clinic for a couple of hours. I wasn't supposed to work at all, but there was an emergency with one of the guys I—"

"Don't care," Sherlock briskly cut him off. "And yes, of course Mary can stay here."

"Good, I really wasn't asking," John appreciatively conceded. Just then, he heard the bathroom door open and his wife emerge. "We'll be by soon. Bye."

"Are you talking to yourself?" Mary asked, waddling toward her husband, who handed her the tea off the nightstand.

"Uh, no, that was Sherlock…"

"Oh, what did he want?"

Truth? No, definitely not. She too would assume she was being babysat. Bad road. "He actually wanted to know if we wanted to go over there."

Mary gave him a suspicious look. "Sherlock wants us to visit…for what?"

"Uh, well, not really Sherlock. Mrs. Hudson wants to make lunch for all of us since she's not seen us in a while."

"Aw, that's sweet," Mary smiled, clutching her stomach as she lowered herself onto the bed, careful not to spill the tea. "But don't you have to go to the clinic this morning?"

"Yeah, Mrs. Gellar scheduled an appointment."

"She's the one that won't see anyone but you?" Mary checked, and John nodded. "Huh, should I be jealous?"

"Of a seventy-five year old lady? Probably."

"Well, I bet she's not the size of a house."

"No, no she's not," John agreed. "But I have always had a thing for women with their own teeth, so she's out of the running. There is, however, a seventy- _two_ year old…" Mary finally gave into a little laugh which seemed to calm all her visibly tense muscles at least for the moment. "You go on to Baker Street, and I'll come by after. Should be done around one."

"Alright," Mary said with a smile, setting down her tea. "I'm going to have a snack before we go. Do we still have the leftover spaghetti in the fridge?"

"Mmhm." An unknowing person would probably comment that Mary was just about to go eat lunch, so a bowl of spaghetti wasn't really a "snack," but John didn't dare. His will to live was still very much intact.

"Hello Mary!" Mrs. Hudson gleefully greeted when the parents-to-be arrived at 221B. "Hi John, come in, both of you, it's chilly out."

The warmth of the flat welcomed them when the landlady shut the door with a strong push. "Sorry we're a bit late," Mary apologized, taking off her scarf and hanging it up on the coat rack. "Our elevators out again, and it takes a while for me to go down the stairs."

"That's alright, dear." Mrs. Hudson put Mary's coat in the closet and then took a moment to beam at her. "Oh, you are glowing… isn't she John?"

John just smiled and discreetly rubbed his hand against Mary's back, where he knew there was pain. She smiled and then quickly excused herself to use the bathroom. When she was out of ear shot, John came closer to his old landlady and whispered, "Thanks for doing this, I know you weren't planning on cooking for three today. Actually four, considering how Mary's been eating."

"It's alright, John. I don't blame her for needing to get out of the house, especially since she was so alone for most of the pregnancy." Oblivious to the look of restrained disbelief John was giving her, Mrs. Hudson broke into a wide smile. "And I like the company. I can't wait until it's the little one you'll be bringing over!"

John smiled and gave a small nod. "Right, well, I should be off." He tightened the scarf around his neck and glanced up the stairs. "Please make sure Sherlock doesn't run off on any cases."

"I'll do my best." She gave him a parting smile, and John headed out.

Lunch was served, eaten, and cleaned up in less than an hour. The table talk most likely consisted of Mrs. Hudson coming up with names for the baby and discussing what kind of toys make babies smarter. Sherlock showed no interest in any of the topics, he was obviously wrapped up in something else—what that something was, of course, was anyone's guess.

It was just past noon when Mary laid herself down on the couch upstairs, exhausted from the trek to the second floor. "Sherlock," she asked the man whose eyes were studying a map of London that had several spots marked on it, "why is there a dart in the cushion?" She pulled it out for him to see.

"Oh that," he said, glancing briefly at the item in her hand. "I was bored."

She shook her head with a smile and tried to get comfortable. She tossed one way, then the other, she tried propping herself up, lying on her side with a pillow under her tummy. Nothing worked. "Ughhh," she groaned to herself.

"What's wrong?"

"It's impossible to lay down when you've got a tiny human growing inside you."

He shrugged. "One would think."

Finally, when she realized it was a lost cause, Mary swung her legs over the side of the couch and brought herself up. There was a touch of dizziness as her head returned to being above her body, but she recovered quickly. "I can't lie down, and I can't sit here. I need to go do something… will you go for a walk with me?"

"No," he answered officially and without consideration.

"Why not?"

"I have strict orders not to let you do anything strenuous or labor-inducing. Going for a walk is on the list." He held up a sheet a notebook paper with scribbling on it.

Mary snatched it from him and puzzlingly perused through the bullet points. "Did John give you this?"

"Yes. He mentioned you might suggest different things to try to induce labor. Going for a walk, eating spicy foods, stretching, exercise—he mentioned sex also helps induce labor, though I don't see that coming into play." Mary rolled her eyes. "I am under instruction not to let you do any of that."

"You've got to be kidding."

"Nope."

Mary thought hard, seeing that there was no way around this. She desperately needed to do _something_ , and she was well-aware of John's intentions behind suggesting lunch at 221B Baker Street. It was a nice thought, but whether she was at home or at Sherlock's flat she was going to go mad. Every minute was a waiting game. After enough time had gone by, she pushed herself off the couch and motioned coolly over to Sherlock. "So, have you had any new cases?" she asked innocently, sneaking a peek at some notes on his desk.

"A couple," he answered cautiously, giving her a sideways look.

"But nothing interesting?" she followed up.

"Some…why so curious?"

"Oh, I'm not…" she responded. "I just assumed. Since you were, you know, throwing darts at the sofa."

"I've been bored before," Sherlock evaded. "It's not an unusual occurrence. If you really want to make John happy do what he does and start checking the place for cigarettes."

"Yeah, I know…you get bored a lot…" Sherlock turned and gave her a suspicious look; she was playing it extremely cool. He wasn't sure why yet. "It's just, you've not often been bored when there's a map in front of you with markings, post-its with notes scribbled all over them cluttering up your desk, and a scarf on the 'client chair' that I know doesn't belong to you or John, and was obviously important enough for you to keep it rather than throwing it out the window like you usually do…"

Sherlock stared stoically. She was good. "What's the end goal here?"

"Alright, you have a case and clearly my being here is keeping you from it since John is making you watch me…like I'm some sort of puppy." She muttered that last part under her breath. "All I want is to go outside and get some air, to not be stuck on a couch, just walk around a bit. And maybe, while we're out...well, I'm just saying I couldn't stop you if you were to stumble onto one of these places," she nonchalantly pointed to the map spread in front of him. "After all, this point right here…well, that's right near Williamson's park, isn't it. Huh."

OOOOO

"Sixty-thousand," Sherlock said finitely, helping Mary out of the taxi cab when the two of them arrived at the park.

"What?"

"That's how many ways John will want to kill me when he finds out I brought you here. Sixty-thousand."

"Oh, Sherlock," she giggled, taking him by the arm. "John will be fine. And he may be a doctor, but that doesn't make him my boss."

"Though, as a nurse, you do work under him," the detective said snarkily.

"Yeah, it was 'working' _under_ him that got me this way…" Mary quipped back, resting a hand on her stomach.

"What?"

"Come on." It was January, but there air wasn't too cold. Still, they were wrapped up, so much so that Mary's hand couldn't even feel the baby moving through her layers. She could certainly feel it inside, though. She led him to a path that circled around some barren trees and the remnants of what had been gardens in the spring and summer. They went along slowly, since it was the only speed available to the blonde, but that was alright with Sherlock. It gave him time to take in the area—collect data.

"Um, Sherlock," Mary said after a while. "Friend of yours?"

Sherlock looked back seeing to whom Mary was referring. It was a short, skinny fellow in an oversized coat. The coat was old and worn, and he didn't seem to have much on underneath it, save for a raggedy white t-shirt and a pair of torn sweatpants. "Right on time," Sherlock said, sounding satisfied.

"Here you go, it's the address you asked for," the man said, he couldn't have been much older than thirty. Sherlock exchanged the folded up piece of paper for a fifty pound note in one swift handshake, and then the man was off.

"He's so young," Mary sadly remarked, watching his figure disappear into the trees that lined the footpath. Sherlock didn't hear her though, he was studying his new information. "What's that?"

"An address."

She rolled her eyes at him. "I can see that. What's it for?"

"You pulled your jacket tighter," he sidestepped, looking at her a bit more intensely. "Why?"

"Just getting a bit nippy out here."

He looked back down at the note in his hands, and then to Mary again. "Want to go somewhere warmer?"


	13. Chapter 13

**Happy Holidays all! I know it's been a while since I last posted, so I made this chapter a bit longer. Hope it's not too long! Anyway enjoy :)**

The Cheshire Cat Inn could only be described as a figurine-infested melting pot of every cheesy and cringe-worthy fairytale cliché to ever soil page and cinema. The walls were defaced with murals of pocket-watch-wearing rabbits and far too many prince charming's. Everything had a smell that would make any normal person recoil. And nearly every decoration, and there were many, looked as though it were being sentenced to a lifetime of children's curious fingers and adults dirty minds.

"Doesn't really seem like your kind of place," Mary teasingly remarked upon walking in.

"Can I help you?" beckoned the overly-friendly chime of the woman at the front desk. Her smile took up most of her face.

"Ah, yes," Sherlock said cheerfully, putting on his sweetest smile. "The Mrs. and I would like to check in, we're absolutely exhausted from traveling and, as you can see, the little one's really worn my wife out." He gave Mary's tummy a delicate rub, which came as a bit of a surprise to her—one she could not hide. "We'd love a room for the night."

"Oh, congratulations!" The overzealous clerk sang, her smile actually growing wider. "Let me just see which room we can put you in. And don't worry, darling," she said to Mary, "I'll make sure it's on the first floor." Mary gave Sherlock a look as the woman perused; it was as that point he remembered to take his hand off her stomach. "Here we go! Room 104," she said, handing them a key, which unsurprisingly had a Hansel and Gretel chain attached to it. "Just let me know when you'd like your bags brought in. I'll have one of our boys carry them in. And there's a pianist in the dining room right now taking requests, it's just past the double doors over there."

"Thank you." Sherlock put a hand on Mary's back and led her in that direction. "I think we'll go have a listen."

"You'll be up for a BAFTA soon," Mary whispered when they were far enough away.

"Don't question my methods, you sound just like John."

"What's the point of all this? Why are we here?"

"Because," Sherlock told her, as they entered the dining room where there was indeed a pianist serenading the audience of weekenders far too excited to be staying at this place. "I had to see the guest book. There's a man staying here called Jeffrey Garrideb, he's out on business right now, but he should be back here later today. He's a client."

Mary looked confused. "If he's a client why did you need to see where he's staying? Why not just ask him? Also, let's sit, my legs are giving up." She didn't wait for Sherlock to agree with the suggestion, she just plopped down into an open chair at an unset table.

Sherlock sat down with her and went on to tell her about the case he was investigating. As it turned out, Garrideb had a very peculiar situation. He had come to Sherlock roughly a week ago with a strange story that all circulated around his very odd last name. Following clue after clue, Sherlock had concluded that Garrideb was using the detective's abilities to expedite an elaborate scam targeting another man with the same odd last name. All Sherlock had to do now was confirm his suspicion.

"So if he's not here yet, why are we?" Mary fairly asked, setting her chin on an angled wrist.

"Groundwork." He sprang up from the table and excitedly grabbed the hand of the first man that walked by him, pretending to know the stranger. Mary guessed immediately that his choice, however, was not random.

Sherlock jabbered on and on with the man, whose wife joined them shortly after. Many of the pleasantries circulated around Garrideb, who Sherlock proposed was a mutual acquaintance between the two. From her slight distance away, Mary could see the detective's eye follow closely every word the company had to say about the client in question. As an added bonus, seeing Sherlock pretend to be a friendly, extroverted, socially-charged man was hilarious to her. Though the process was taking quite some time.

"Um, Sherlock…" Mary cut in impatiently.

"One moment dear," he said dismissively, still focusing on the man who was happily beginning to think he had actually known Sherlock from a previous function.

"Is this your wife?" the lady on the stranger's arm asked, looking at the woman who sat alone at the table about ten feet away.

"Yes, she is. Now, as I was saying, Garrideb—"

The lady cut him off. "Maybe you should go check on her, she looks uncomfortable."

Sherlock looked behind him at Mary, and felt his stomach jump into his throat when he saw her. She was keeled over with a hand tightly clutching her abdomen and a painful look smearing her face. "Oh, um, no she's fine," he said, mostly to himself, desperately hoping it was true.

"I don't think so…" the man said, now looking over at Mary.

Sherlock swallowed hard, and abandoned the couple without another word. "Mary," he said nervously, kneeling down in front of her. "What's going on, why are you doing that?"

She breathed deeply and winced at another pain before meeting his eyes. "It feels like a contraction…" A smile crept to her lips, even through the pain. "I think this is it…"

"Now?!"

She nodded and gave her friend a reassuring pat on the arm. "Call John."

"Right, of course, John." Sherlock fumbled getting his phone out, clearly ill-prepared for this. Mary couldn't help, but chuckle—which was much easier to do when the contraction had subsided. "Come on, come on…" he frenziedly repeated in muffled mutters. "John's not answering. What the hell could he possibly be doing?"

"Just relax," Mary eased, motioning for Sherlock to come back over to her. "Try again, but help me up first."

"Where are you going?"

"Well, I'm not having the baby in this dining room, am I? Let's go." Sherlock agreed and took her out, keeping a hand behind her…because it seemed like the right thing to do.

"Right, Mrs. Cassini, just see the nurse on your way out and we can schedule a follow-up in three weeks to have a look at that knee." John waved to his smiling patient as she left the examination room, and then snapped off his latex gloves, tossing them into the bin. "Lara, was that the last one?"

The intern looked up from her place in the corner of the room where she had been observing throughout the check-up. "Yep, you're 1 o'clock was cancelled."

"Thank God," he breathed, closing up his patient folder. "I can't believe I haven't heard from Sherlock yet," he kept on, digging into his pocket for his phone. "I was sure he'd be bored out of his—" John's face froze when he saw '6 missed calls' staring him in the face upon unlocking his screen. "Oh God," he exhaled. Hustling out of the room toward his office, he immediately dialed the detective. "Pick up you prick!" he demanded into the phone on the third ring, as he flung open his office door, dropping the files and searching for his car keys. Finally, the call was answered. "Sherlock, what's going on!"

"Okay, stay calm," Sherlock began, though he felt pretty damn anxious himself. "Mary's in labor."

"What?!" The words could have knocked him over, but he did his best to regain his composure. "Why didn't you call me earlier?!"

"I tried, you didn't answer! Keep your phone on silent when your pregnant wife is with _me_ , great idea."

"Well, how's she doing, let me talk to her."

Sherlock dutifully passed the phone to Mary who sat beside him on the bed they had recently acquired as faux husband and wife. "John?"

"Mary, what's happening…I mean, is it really—"

"I think so," she said nodding, even though he couldn't see her. "Poor Sherlock's a bit off color over here." She soothingly patted his arm with a sympathetic smile.

"I don't care how he's doing, are you alright?" John finally found his keys and didn't waste any time in fleeing the clinic.

"Yes, I'm alright…the pain isn't too bad," she answered, glancing again at a very pale Sherlock.

"When was the first contraction and how long do they last?"

"Um, about thirty minutes ago I guess, and they're pretty spread out now." She took a deep breath, knowing her husband was about to be very angry very quickly. "Listen, I would have met you at the hospital, but we haven't been able to get a cab…see, this place is a ways away from the city."

John had just made it through the double-doors and outside when she said this. It was then he came to a screeching halt, praying he hadn't heard her correctly. "This place? You aren't at Baker Street…"

"No, we're at the Cheshire Cat Inn, it wasn't supposed to—"

"Put Sherlock on the phone please," John requested, in a frighteningly even tone.

"Hello," Sherlock carefully approached when Mary handed him the phone.

"Sherlock," John addressed, still scarily even-toned. That was about to end. "Did you take my nine months pregnant wife on a fucking case?!"

"John, just listen…" he tried.

"I'm going to kill you. If my daughter is born in the back of a cab, I am going to kill you!"

Mary snatched the phone back. "Don't yell at him, I tricked him into going for a walk."

"You didn't trick me," Sherlock objected. Mary just gave him a 'yeah right' look.

"Mary, just tell me how you're feeling, and don't worry about the cab. I'm coming to get you; I'm getting in the car now."

"Oh no, you don't have to. Sherlock took care of it. And honey, I'm fine, really." She hadn't even finished the word when another contraction hit her. "Ahh, that's another one."

Hearing his wife moan through the contraction visibly tore him up as he sat useless in the car outside the hospital. "It's alright, deep breaths," he helplessly coached, biting into his lip and laying his head back as he waited for Mary to tell him when it ended. It felt like an eternity, even though John's stopwatch, which he had started keeping in the car a month ago, only read thirty-seven seconds. "Was that one longer than the last?

"Um, no…Sherlock's been timing them."

Just then, John heard Sherlock's robotic voice mutter 'he's here' in the background. "Who's there?"

"I'm not sure, but we're leaving now. I'll meet you at the hospital. John, please don't worry, it's okay."

"I want to stay on the phone."

"Honey, no, it just makes it harder…especially for you. We'll be there soon, I promise." She and Sherlock were just making it back into the lobby which was thankfully very close to their room when Mary saw what ride Sherlock had arranged. "We'll be there _very_ soon. I love you, bye." She hung up before John could make any other objections, knowing that he'd probably worry himself into a heart attack if she stayed on the phone.

"So, you take your best friend's wife on a case and send her into labor, there's a fine headline for Sherlock Holmes," Lestrade said, stepping out of the cruiser to meet the two. "I got here as fast as I could. You said you didn't need the ambulance."

"No, we don't," Mary said with a smile, nearly blinded by the flashing blue lights. "Thanks for coming."

Lestrade nodded a 'you're welcome.' "Let's get you to the hospital then."

Sherlock had previously doubted Lestrade's high-speed chase capabilities, based on outside observation and first-hand passenger experience, but his mind was slowly changing watching the detective-inspector weave in and out of London's noontime traffic. He didn't forget to pay attention to Mary though; by now he knew when she was having contractions based on her pupils, breathing, stomach, and visible pulse. There was something else though, he had been asking her repeatedly if she was okay, and physically she seemed to be doing alright, but her spirit certainly wasn't as high as it was before.

"Mary," he said quietly, after her contraction ended. "What's the matter?"

She looked up at him sadly and tried to smile, but it fell. She shook her head at herself. "I'm alright, it's just…I don't think this is it."

"What?"

She sighed a frustrated sigh. "I felt the first contraction over an hour ago, and they haven't gotten any worse. They aren't getting closer together, and they haven't been happening at regular intervals."

"So, what are you saying?" Clearly Sherlock's pregnancy studies had not made it this far yet.

"I think it's Braxton Hicks," Mary said, and fell disheartened back into the seat. "I'm not in labor."

"What?"

"What!" Lestrade echoed in the front seat.

"Are you sure?" Sherlock asked.

"Pretty sure." Sherlock could see her eyes beginning to water, but didn't mention it.

"I left a crime scene to do this," Lestrade mumbled in the front seat.

"Oh like it matters, Garret," Sherlock retorted.

Mary apologized to her driver anyway. "I'm sorry."

The cop shrugged. "It's alright, probably best you see a doctor anyway."

"Let's start with this one." Sherlock lifted his head toward the man jogging toward the entrance of the hospital car park as they pulled up to it.

"Afternoon John," Lestrade said with a friendly wave that went ignored.

John didn't even hear him; he just came over to Mary's side and yanked open the door to help her out. "Hey, how you doing, love, still alright? Sherlock, when was the last contraction?" That's when he saw the tears in her eyes and felt his heart suddenly sink. "Why are you crying? What happened?"

She quickly wiped her eyes and shook her head to reassure him. "No, nothing happened. It's not the real thing, John. I thought it was, but it's not. I'm just being emotional."

He was confused, but only for a moment before a look of realization spread through his face. "Braxton?" he asked, and Mary nodded feeling silly. John wrapped a secure and comforting arm around her, grateful to have his wife with him, and looked to Sherlock for an explanation. "Did you time them?"

"Yes, and wrote them down. Mary told me to." Sherlock handed him a small piece of paper with his scrawling on it.

When John reviewed it, he came to the same conclusion Mary had in the car. He couldn't decide between feeling relieved or disappointed. He gave Mary's arm a rub, knowing full well what her feelings were. "Well, we're going to have you looked at anyway." Mary nodded, expecting he would. "Thanks for driving, Greg."

The D.I. nodded once more, got back into his car, and left the scene, leaving a very quiet Sherlock behind. "So," the trench-coated man began, "I'll probably just head back to Baker Street."

"You aren't going anywhere," John warned, using his soldier voice. "What the hell were you thinking?"

"John, please, not now," Mary pleaded, with a hand on his chest. "I just want to be seen and then go home."

With a tightened jaw, John looked between the two of them several times, already knowing Sherlock was going to get away with this. "Fine," he surrendered. "Go wherever you want to go, but don't think I won't—"

"John," Mary protested again. "Let's just go in."John obliged and Sherlock mouthed a silent 'thank you' before heading off somewhere safer. "Don't be mad at him," Mary said as the Watsons made their way slowly to the hospital entrance. "He was great, really…scared to death, but that was kind of funny. He even offered to hold my hand because he said he's seen it in a film. I told him the pain wasn't bad enough for that."

John grasped his wife's hand and kept a guiding arm behind her back as they moved through the crosswalk. "Almost there…" he said, knowing she was probably exhausted already. "Are you alright?"

"I told you, I'm—"

"No, I mean about it only being Braxton Hicks."

Her mouth turned sadly upside down. "I was so excited when I felt the first contraction, nervous of course, and I wanted you to be there, but still more excited than anything else. I just want her to come out already! I want to know that she's healthy and nothing went…wrong."

"Nothing is going to go wrong." John pulled her closer and kissed her head. "Trust me, I'm a doctor."

She laughed and rubbed her stomach. "You're also an expectant father, there's a conflict of interest there." They reached the double-glass doors and John pulled them open for his wife, who didn't seem particularly game to go in. "Do I really need to get checked out? We both know it's only Braxton Hicks."

"Yes, you do. I'm not about to drive all the way back home only to have your water break."

Reluctantly, Mary waddled in with John following close behind her. "For the record, Sherlock carries rubber gloves around with him in case I go into labor and we can't get to a hospital. He pulled them out at the inn."

"Yeah, I'm definitely going to kill him."

OOOOO

The blue glow of the TV flickered on the bedroom wall as John dozed off to the 11 o'clock news. Next to him, Mary was perusing through a baby names book under the yellow lamplight coming from the nightstand. "Ooh," she uttered, feeling a jolt inside her belly. "John," she said softly, nudging his shoulder.

"Mm," John inaudibly grunted, not opening his eyes.

"She's kicking, give me your hand." Mary took John's left hand out from under the covers and placed it on the spot she felt the baby, just below her navel.

John smiled and his eyes fluttered open when he felt the movements under his hand. He came closer and kissed Mary's bump. "Are you trying to keep mummy up again?"

"Just giving us practice for when she's out I guess," Mary reasoned with a chuckle. "Although, what's really keeping me up is the smell of that pie in the kitchen. Think I'll have some."

"No, no," John said, stopping her getting out of bed. "I'll get it for you, just stay here."

Mary smirked contently. "Alright." John was back in no time with a plate of warm pie and a spoon that Mary eagerly grabbed when it was close enough. "Thanks hun," she said, already taking the first bite. She moaned when the taste melted in her mouth. "This is perfect."

"I can tell," John affirmed, stifling a chuckle. He sunk back down under the covers and closed his eyes, letting himself nod off again.

Mary set the plate down on her belly, which was a truly perfect height for food, and continued eating as she flipped through the pages. "How can we not have a name yet?!" she suddenly ejected, startling John.

"We have names…" he said groggily, closing his eyes again.

"Not enough," she responded desperately, and shoved another piece of pie into her mouth. "What if we see her and decide that none of the names we've picked out fit? Or what if we choose something and then realize later we should have chosen something else?"

"That's not going to happen."

"It could."

"Mary, don't get all worked up about something this silly now…please. Anxiety is not going to help at this point." John had opened his eyes long enough to notice something in the corner of his line of sight. "And don't put your arm above your head like that."

Mary rolled her eyes at the irony of John's 'stress' plea, but took her arm down anyway. "Why don't you go to sleep, you're exhausted."

"No, I'm not."

"Really? You can barely keep your eyes open." She returned her focus to the book.

"Nope, I'm wide awake…alert…ready for anything."

"Right."

It was only three full minutes before the hushed voices on telly were drowned out by John's soft snoring. Mary, still very much awake, smiled to herself and turned the TV off. She knew she would be exhausted tomorrow and probably spend a good portion of it asleep, but somehow that wasn't enough to persuade her now. She couldn't try to sleep if she wanted to.

She set the book down on the nightstand and finished the last bits of pie, wrapping John's hand in hers and smiling as her baby danced under the balancing plate.

John woke up to an empty bed the next morning, which, after the second or two it took to realize it, jolted him up in search of his wife. "Mary?" he called out hoarsely, rubbing his hands over his face.

"Kitchen!" she yelled back.

John breathed a sigh of relief and swung his legs over the side of the bed, feet abruptly meeting the cold floor. He sauntered into the living room and then the kitchen, but couldn't find his wife. He could hear her labored breaths though. "Um, Mary?"

"Over here." Out of sight, she was crouched down on the floor behind the island counter.

"What the—?" John was about to ask her what she was doing, but when she became visible, he didn't have to. There, with all fours on the tile, she was vehemently scrubbing the floor. He knew he probably couldn't stop her, but he tried anyway. He tried four times. Each time, her response became more rabid.

He really wished she'd stop for a moment to take a rest, or really do anything besides intensely scrub the floor, but he figured she would soon enough tire herself out. So, he waited.

It was just past ten, and Mary had moved onto the windows. Not a single spot was acceptable to her; they had to be completely clean. "Mary, please, you're going to pass out…you need to eat something."

She clenched her teeth, quite fed up with his constant worrying. She was tired of sitting around all the time like a lump. Today was the first time in ages she'd not felt like her lungs were being squeezed up by her uterus and she was not going to waste it. "For the millionth time, John, I am _fine_. I know my body. I know my limits. Why don't you go see what Sherlock is up to?"

"Oh no," he decreed, in something akin to a scoff. "I am not leaving you alone." Before Mary could shoot back, the doorbell rang and John popped up to get it. "Tread carefully," he said, when he saw it was Sherlock on the other side.

"What?"

"You'll see…"

"Oh, hi Sherlock," Mary chimed happily from across the flat, turning briefly from the window to see who the visitor was. "I didn't know you were coming over."

"Just thought I'd drop by," he responded, staring quizzically at the way Mary vigorously scrubbed the windows. "Why is she doing that?" he whispered to John, who watched his friend's look with amusement.

"Nesting instinct," the doctor simply replied.

"You're making that up."

"Nope. Women tend to do things like this before they go into labor. Clean out closets, wash everything, make space, whatever they feel needs to be done. She's done this at least eight times in the last two weeks."

"Does she know she's doing it?"

"Your guess is as good as mine; besides, good luck trying to get her to admit it." John took a slow sip of his tea and moseyed into the kitchen to grab the morning paper he had not yet had a chance to read.

Sherlock, with some degree of stealth, made his way over to Mary. "Ooh! You snuck up on me," Mary lightly exclaimed when he suddenly showed up at her side. For the first time, she noticed the brown paper bag in his hand. "What's that?"

With tact, Sherlock glanced back at John to make sure he was still preoccupied by the newspaper. He was. "It's the spiciest dish I could find in the city. It's for you."

"Sorry?"

"Yesterday, you were telling me how you're sick of being pregnant and want the baby out and a slew of other complaints I didn't really hear…well, according to John and my own research, eating spicy things can help induce labor. So…here." He pushed the bag discreetly toward her. "Eat it and get this thing going. There's ghost pepper powder on the side, if that doesn't kick things off I have Naga Viper extract in my pocket."

"What?" Mary whispered in disbelief.

"More potent than the ghost pepper, but no one ever gives it any credit."

"Have you gone mad?" Mary looked down at the bag and then discreetly to her husband. "John is going to have a fit. He's been adamant about not trying anything to induce unless it becomes necessary. And you want me to eat the world's hottest peppers?"

"Why does he drag his heels so much? You can't be pregnant forever. Right?"

She shook her head. "I think he's still nervous. Not to mention, he's not the one that actually has to be pregnant." She went back to her window. "Why do you care so much?"

"About what?"

"Me going into labor, why are you trying to rush it?"

"You're a week past your due date; I wouldn't call that rushing."

"Sherlock…" she warned.

He rolled his eyes, and realized the answer was apparently not as obvious as he thought it was. "Mrs. Hudson won't stop squealing and clapping her hands together any time your name or John's is mentioned; John is a constant nervous wreck and it's annoying; your mood swings have gotten so bad it's a miracle you haven't driven yourself mad; Molly has been trying to teach me to change a diaper which has been, at best, horrendous; and Mycroft and I have a bet that I need to win." Sherlock folded his hands behind his back. "Should I list more or is that enough for now?"

"You made a bet with your brother about me?!" she yelled in appall.

"Several. What else are we supposed to talk about?"

"I'm sure you two could come up with _something_." She grumbled and went back to work.

"You can't imagine the struggle…"

"I'm sure I can," she retorted.

"You really can't." Sherlock looked at the pane and admired the job Mary had done on the window. Although just by looking at the glass, he could see her arm was tiring out, and that she hadn't had the same enthusiasm she did when she started this task ten—no, fifteen—minutes ago. "In any case, I'll just leave this here," Sherlock whispered, setting the bag down in front of her where John couldn't see. "I know you're sick of being pregnant, so accept this as my peace offering for using your gestation to make money off my brother."

The detective moseyed away from her and joined John in the kitchen. "I need your medical opinion on something; a man's alibi depends on it," he started.

John took a sip from his mug and stared up at his friend. "Go on then."

"You're familiar with entomotoxicology, yes?"

"Sure," John answered with a shrug.

The boys went on to chat about Sherlock's recent observations at a crime scene so much so that neither noticed when Mary had exited the living room and headed into the bedroom. It was only when John casually glanced, mid-sentence, toward the window she had previously been occupying that he realized she had vacated the area. "Where's Mary?"

Sherlock attempted at once to pull him back into the conversation. "In the flat, I'm assuming. Now about the maggots…if the victim was on cocaine—"

"Mary!" John called in the direction of the bedroom, ignoring Sherlock now.

"Yes, John…" she responded, in an apparently irate tone.

John went to her, despite Sherlock's second try at keeping him in the kitchen. "Hey, what are you doing in here?" he asked sweetly.

Mary was lying on the bed, looking just a bit guilty, though John didn't seem to detect it. "Just got tired all of a sudden. I'll be back out in a little while. I just needed to lie down for a bit."

"Alright, as long as you're—" He stopped and sniffed the air. "What's that smell?"

"I think it's coming from the kitchen," Sherlock immediately answered.

"No…" John followed his nose over to the side of the bed where Mary was stretched out. When he found the source of the scent, he stopped on a dime and his shoulders suddenly became those of a soldier. "Are you kidding me?"

"What?" Sherlock asked, poorly playing dumb.

John lifted the brown bag up from the floor, the spicy smell encasing the room even more strongly, and moved his eyes back and forth between his wife and his friend. "Did you bring her this?"

"No."

"Sherlock," Mary scolded, sitting up a bit.

"Oh, like you weren't going to eat it," the detective immaturely retorted.

"Does he bring you something to induce labor every time he comes here?" John sarcastically asked the woman staring up at him. He turned back to Sherlock with more chagrin. "What was it yesterday? Castor oil? Day before that, a dirty magazine to encourage…actually, I don't know what you were thinking with that one."

"Me neither," Mary agreed, remembering.

"You aren't off the hook either," he retorted back to his wife.

"I didn't eat the food, John," she replied. "I knew you would freak out…the way you do with most things I do." She added that last part in a whisper, but certainly loud enough for John to hear.

"I do not freak out!"

"You're doing it right now."

"She's right," Sherlock contributed, earning a glare from John.

"Does anyone here give even the tiniest of cares that I _am_ a doctor, and might, just _might_ , know a bit about when it is healthiest for my wife to go into labor?"

"Honey, no one is saying you don't know better," Mary said comfortingly, rubbing his forearm since it was within reach.

"Although there may be a conflict of interest…" Sherlock put in, which did not please the pregnant lady.

"Isn't there a murder you could be solving somewhere?" John fired back. Obviously, stress was beginning to get the best of him again.

"Sherlock," Mary eased, "could you give us a second?" The detective nodded and left the bedroom, deciding to go check on the nursery again, just to make sure it was safe and suitable for the baby, whom he guessed would be sleeping in it any day now.

"He's got a lot of nerve, you know that," John mumbled, sitting down onto the bed when Mary pulled him closer. "This isn't his baby. It's mine. And yours."

"I know, I know."

"And we put it in there, so we decide when it comes out."

"Nicely put," Mary said, with a slight grimace at the word choice. She shook it off and took his hand. "But he's only trying to help. And you know he's nervous about the baby and how it will change things…he's just trying to get it all going so he doesn't have to deal with the anticipation anymore."

"He's a twat."

Mary ignored the statement and kept on going with hers. "You, on the other hand, are doing the exact opposite. You're nervous, so you're putting it all off. It's like you never want me to go into labor!"

"Oh, Mary, no," John sincerely and apologetically pleaded, realizing how it could come off that way. He put both hands lovingly on her tummy. "I can't wait to meet her, and hold her. Genuinely. I know it's probably going to be the most amazing thing I ever get to do."

"Then why don't you want to speed things up?" she asked desperately, throwing both hands up. "John, you really can't understand what's it's like to be pregnant this long. I'm almost two weeks over due! And I just get bigger every day and I'm always hungry, nothing feels good, there are no comfortable positions, and I'm pretty sure breathing will never be the same again."

"Trust me, I know it's not been fun for you…and I sincerely thank you for being the one who has to do it, but it will happen. And the healthiest way is to let it happen on its own."

"People induce their own labor all the time and things go fine. You need to stop worrying so much." She leaned her back against the headboard and sighed. "You worry when I have enough energy to clean, you worry when I don't have any energy to do anything, you worry when I feel her kick, or when I try to walk anywhere. When I sit, when I stand, when I laugh, when I cry. I love you, but it's driving me mad."

"I'm sorry…" He dropped his gaze down and rubbed her leg. After a long and calming sigh, his eyes met hers again. "I will try to stop being mental over all this."

"Thank you."

"I'm not saying I'll do it successfully."

"I know," she said with a nod, appreciating the offer all the same.

"I'll probably fail miserably…"

"John," she sternly warned. "Don't ruin it."

"Right, sorry."

"And maybe you should…" she jerked her head in the direction of the other room.

"Do panto?"

"Apologize to Sherlock…you shouted at him."

"Oh, come on," John whined. "If you're worried about his ego, I'm sure it's still very much intact."

"Look, here he comes, apologize," she said softly when the detective appeared in the doorway.

Sherlock didn't hesitate to share what he had found. "There are four possible ways an intruder could get into the nursery; seriously, are normal people just willingly blind?" John and Mary shared a look, and then returned their attention to the suit-clad man in their bedroom. "I've managed to eliminate two of them, but the other two are going to require more extensive reconstruction."

Mary nudged at John's arm, to which her husband lowly sighed. "Sherlock," he began from his seat on the bed. "I'm sorry I yelled at you about the spicy food."

Sherlock's brows angled downward. "You're making him apologize," he said to Mary.

"No, he means it…he knows he's been acting crazy," she responded confidently.

"Good, I'll go get you extra hot sauce for the food I brought you." He turned to go, but was stopped immediately by John.

"No, wait, Sherlock, that's not happening. We're not trying to induce."

The detective's eyes rolled ostentatiously. "Why not? I thought you were done being crazy."

"It's not a good idea. We're going to wait until the baby is ready or until Dr. Marshall gives us the green light. And that's the end of it."

"Hmm, perfectly easy for you to do, I'm sure Mary's got another opinion." He looked to her for support, but she didn't respond. Either she was gratifying John's wishes or she didn't want to get in between them. "Oh come on, John, she's in pain. Let her go get this over with."

"The birth of my child is not something I'm trying to 'get over with,' Sherlock," Mary spoke up. "And I'm not in pain."

"Please," Sherlock complacently replied. "You've had three contractions since I've been here."


	14. Chapter 14

_~"Please," Sherlock complacently replied. "You've had three contractions since I've been here."~_

"She has not," John refuted, fully confident he would know if his wife was having a contraction. However, when he looked back to Mary for a reassuring nod, he found another expression canvassing her face, forcing a double-take. The realization didn't take more than a second. He sprang off the bed. "My God, is he right?! Brilliant, just brilliant. You know I never get tired of that," he burst, thrusting a finger aggressively at Sherlock.

"It's just Braxton Hicks again, John," Mary quickly answered. "I've been keeping track of them. It's the same ones I had earlier this week and at the inn last week."

"And were you going to tell me?" He couldn't help feeling a bit sucker-punched. Had he been so unbearably crazy that she couldn't even tell him when she was in pain?

"Honey, it's not a big deal. If they had really been bothering me, I would have told you."

"Jesus…" he murmured to himself, arms akimbo and eyes to the floor. After a few breaths, he looked back at Mary. "You're sure it's not the real thing?"

"Yes, I'm sure."

He nodded, seemingly calming down. "Hand me the bag, please." Mary willingly passed him Sherlock's brown-bagged gift, having had no intention of eating it anyway. John headed toward the door, sternly pointing his finger through it as a command to Sherlock, which the detective followed without incident. When they got to the living room, John looked back once to make sure Mary hadn't followed. "Alright, are you going to listen?"

"If you insist."

"There will be no more 'operation induce labor' from you or anyone else, is that understood? You can tell me I'm being a prick or I'm too uptight and nervous about the whole thing, you're bloody right I am! But that doesn't change the fact that this is my baby and my wife and if I don't want to take unnecessary risks with them, then that's it."

"It's just as much Mary's baby, and she wants to induce," Sherlock rebutted. "Actually, it's probably more hers since it's actually attached at the moment."

"Mary is nine months pregnant," John said incredulously. "Her hormones are driving her crazy. One minute she's thrilled, the next she's furious. Two nights ago, she was in tears because I killed a spider on the wall. She said she wanted me to move out. Five minutes later, she wanted to rip my clothes off. She's not any more objective than I am at this point." John sighed in completion. "Besides, if she hates me now for not wanting to induce she's going to hate me a hell of a lot more when she actually goes into labor."

Sherlock nodded in agreement. "It's probable. I read that women can break their husbands' hands during labor."

"Yeah, great, cheers," John sarcastically replied with a wrinkled brow.

There was a second or two where neither said a word, which Sherlock believed to be a long enough time. "Well, as long as we're done exhausting this topic, let's move on to something of more interest."

"Here we go." John lowered himself into the armchair, putting his chin into his palm. "Is this another diversionary case to distract me while you go give Mary a burrito?"

"No, and the case I was describing to you before was entirely real."

"Was it?"

"Yes, of course…I wrapped it up two years ago."

John scoffed, not at all surprised. "So what's the actual, real thing you want to talk about now?"

"I've an appointment with a client tomorrow at 9 am. I'd like you to come along."

"Come along where?"

"Slough."

"No."

"You haven't even heard it yet."

"Slough is thirty minutes away by the tube, that's too far."

"It's nothing."

"I'm not going farther than fifteen minutes away. If Mary needs me—"

"She can call you," Sherlock interjected.

John was still shaking his head finitely. "No."

The detective exhaled through his nose and regrouped. "Let me tell you about it first."

"Fine, but it won't change my mind."

"It might when I tell you who the client is." He had John's ear, now he just needed to figure out a way to reel him in. "Tuesday morning I received a phone call; man from Slough, late twenties, works at a paper company, thinks he has a stalker."

"Why's he think that?"

"The usual. Notes left around suggesting it, shadows following him at night, and of course, the tell-tale: these were sent to his house. They're photos of him through his bedroom window." Sherlock tossed the pictures onto the coffee table which sat between the two men and let himself onto the couch to sort through them. Based on the programs on telly that can be seen in the corner of several shots, they were taken all in row, yet on the back of each," Sherlock turned a couple over. "The alleged stalker has marked dates that are one week apart from each other, and the earliest date marked is tomorrow. The obvious inference is that the dates signify a timetable in which threats are to be carried out."

"So why doesn't the bloke phone the police?" John asked, gazing curiously at photos, even studying the dates on the back.

"He was going to, but he then he received a note in the mail. Five words."

John kicked himself for being drawn in, but went ahead and asked anyway. "Which were…?" Sherlock didn't say anything; he just passed him a paper which John guessed to be the note. John read aloud: "Not being clever this time." He looked back up at Sherlock, thinking his friend would be smirking the way he does when he knows he's sparked John's interest with a case, but that wasn't his disposition at all. He looked…grave. If it were at all possible. "Why did this stop him going to the police?"

Sherlock nodded at the logical question. "He told his uncle about the situation, the whole chain of events. And his uncle instructed him not to go to the police, but to come to me instead." John waited for more, but that appeared to be all Sherlock had to say.

"I'm not making a connection, who's the client?"

Sherlock inhaled deeply, never breaking eye contact. "His last name is Sholto."

OOOOO

"I don't understand, the photographer from our wedding…the one who tried to kill James Sholto…he escaped from prison?"

"Looks that way," John said soberly. His body rested hard against the headboard as he stared straight ahead at the darkened wall in the bedroom. Mary was sitting up next to him with her hands dedicatedly on her belly. She looked nearly as distraught as John was, though more for John's sake. She knew how hard the news must have struck him.

"Why wasn't it in the papers?" she asked, disbelievingly.

"It was," he answered. "But it happened two months ago. We missed it because we had other things on our minds, and Sherlock wouldn't have seen it."

She put a comforting hand on his shoulder, "Darling, I'm so sorry."

John looked to her and tried a small smile. "Well, Sherlock is heading there tomorrow. Hopefully he can do what he does and put the bastard away. Permanently this time."

"John," she remarked in an obvious tone. "You've got to go with him."

He was quick to shake his head, even though he truly did want to go and get the arsehole. "No, Mary, I'm not leaving you. It's a half hour away, I'd have to take the tube back, and if anything got delayed or there were any accidents…I'm not taking the chance."

"Honey, I know how you feel about it all," she tried in a softer voice. "The two men who have saved your life on more than one occasion could find themselves in a dangerous situation tomorrow. I would feel incredibly guilty if I didn't demand that you go."

"And if anything happened to you while I was gone, _I_ would feel incredibly guilty." He breathed out and closed his eyes. "I want to go, but…"

"You can." He looked back at her, wishing her statement was founded. "I will be fine. Even if anything were to happen, I can handle it. And there are plenty of people I could call." Still, he needed more convincing. "If it'll put your mind at ease, then tomorrow I will go and spend the morning at Baker Street with Mrs. Hudson. And if you aren't back yet, then I'll go out with Molly in the afternoon."

It took another ten minutes of persuading, but eventually, John did decide to accompany Sherlock the next day. Mary was right; the two men it was now in his interest to help and protect had saved his life far more than once. "And you promise that you will call me even if anything remotely out of the ordinary happens?"

"I swear I will." She gave his hand a reaffirming squeeze and her lips pressed themselves into a modest smile. "Besides, you'll go nutty if you sit here while Sherlock's out having all the fun."

He smiled back at her and mumbled an "uh-huh," trying not to let her be too smug about getting the best of him.

"Ooh," she suddenly gasped, feeling her stomach tighten.

"That another one?"John immediately asked, laying a hand against her belly.

"Yeah, it's alright," she said with a nod. "No worse than the last one."

She had been having Braxton Hicks contractions on and off all night, but insisted they were just that. "Mary, you can't downplay the pain, you need to tell me if it's getting worse."

"I wish it were," she admitted sadly. "But no, and they're getting more spread out, not closer together. It's just practice. And that one's already done with."

John uneasily rubbed her stomach, hoping it was at least a bit helpful. "What the hell am I doing, I can't go tomorrow."

"You're going!" she insisted. "Look at the clock, see…that one was shorter than the last one and farther apart."

"Yeah, but—"

"And Dr. Marshall said last time that the baby isn't low enough yet. And I can feel it, too. She isn't low enough. Please, just trust me. I'll be right here when you get back, and I will, without the slightest doubt, still be carrying your child."

John turned to the blue digital letters glowing on the nightstand. It was 1:15 a.m., nearly two hours after the first faux contraction had woken Mary up. Regrettably, he knew there was no way he could feel good about any decision he made tomorrow, so he resolved to trust his wife. She probably did know her body better than he could, even if she was extremely pregnant right now.

The next morning, John was up earlier than Mary. Although the appointment with Sholto's nephew was not until nine, the detective insisted on getting to his house no later than eight. The client had told Sherlock over the phone that he would be out of the house until quarter to nine for unspecified reasons, and naturally Sherlock Holmes was not about to pass up the opportunity to learn what he could about the client before their scheduled meeting.

"Mary…" John whispered, gently nudging his wife who looked so peaceful between the soft cushion of her pillow and their duvet.

"You're leaving already?" Mary groggily asked as she woke, staring up at John through squinted eyes. "We didn't get to sleep until 2 last night."

"That's why I didn't get you up. You can sleep. I've got to go meet Sherlock." John bent down and kissed his wife. "Make sure you call me if anything happens."

"I will," she promised. "And you call _me_ if anything happens."

He smiled at her, but gave an obeying nod. "But let's not plan for anything though, either of us."

"Deal," she said through a tired smile.

OOOOO

"You do know constantly checking your phone won't change whether or not there's something there to see," Sherlock posed, eyeing John sideways as the two vibrated against the seats in their car which was filled with people checking watches, praying they would get to work on time.

"I just want to make sure I don't lose the signal," John defended, checking his phone one more time. "You know what, I don't have to explain myself to you. You have no idea what's it's like to have a pregnant wife at home. And rather than be with her, I'm off gallivanting with you. I'm an idiot."

"You didn't have to come, you know," Sherlock said coolly.

"Oh, a load of shit that is, you knew I would come."

"And you knew you'd be a nervous wreck if you did," the detective stolidly responded. "We're even." John just put his head back and tried to will the train faster, unsuccessfully, as it actually ended up getting to Slough five minutes late.

Back in London, Mary had finally woken up; this time, ready to start her day. She threw on a loose fitting sweater and got in her morning workout of trying to pull on a pair of maternity jeans, which was no easy task these days. She couldn't help thinking to herself that for the past few weeks, all she had wanted was some time by herself, just like this, with John not anxiously rushing to her side every time she made a noise. And now she missed him. She mentally scoffed at herself, and her screwy hormones.

As she sat alone at the kitchen counter, tea cup between her hands, she debated whether or not to text her husband, just to see how his trip was going. It was now past 9:30, surely they must have met with the client by now. Luckily enough, John beat her to it.

Picking it up, she read succinctly _: So far, so good. Sholto's nephew is safe for the moment. Have you gone to Baker Street yet?_

 _Not yet, heading there soon_ , she responded, sipping the last of her tea.

She was just about to waddle back into the bedroom before leaving the flat, when she was hit with yet another practice contraction, the third one of the morning. This one stilled her for a second. With a wince, she rubbed at the spot on her tummy and chuckled affectionately, "You know, the real thing would be just lovely, little girl."

The walk from the kitchen to the bedroom was enough to wipe her out, so much so that she decided to postpone her original plan to go directly to Baker Street after breakfast. She was almost certain Mrs. Hudson would have plenty to say and could barely muster up the energy to put her shoes on, let alone answer a million questions from the persistent, though well-meaning, landlady. Cuddling up by herself in bed, she stared down at her phone, wondering how the early stages of the Slough investigation were going. 'Why not,' she thought, and hit 1 to call John.

It only took a couple of rings, "Hey," he said eagerly, as if he'd been wanting a call.

"Hi there," Mary replied, lying back against John's pillow. "How's it going?"

"The case, you mean?" John glanced behind him at Sherlock who was crouched on the ground with his portable magnifying glass buried in a potentially useful footprint. "It's alright. Sherlock's got a few ideas as to where the stalker may have taken the pictures."

"Not ideas, John, hypotheses!" Sherlock yelled to him, never moving his eyes away from the dirt.

"He sounds excited," Mary mused.

"It's like Christmas and New Year's all rolled into one," John replied in agreement. He took a few steps away from the crime scene and lowered his voice. "So, you're doing okay?"

"Yeah, I've had a few more Braxton Hicks, but other than that, nothing to report." She tried to think of anything noteworthy. "I feel fatter today, but that's not news."

John smiled sympathetically. "You're not fat, you're pregnant."

"And disco isn't dead; it's 'passed on.'" Just then, another contraction hit, drawing something of a wince on her face. As she grasped her tummy, waiting for it to be over, she allowed John's voice going over a few details about the investigation to soothe her.

"…But besides that, no other leads." Conveniently, he finished recounting the facts at the same time the twinge in her muscles relaxed.

"John, take a look at this!" Sherlock could be heard yelling in the background of the call.

"Oop, I guess you're needed," Mary sighed.

"Yeah, he just wants me to look at something, tell him what I see, and then long-windedly tell me how wrong I am."

"Well, every duo's got to have their gimmick," she offered teasingly. "I'll let you go."

"Alright, I'm hoping we can get back on the train soon, but I don't know what his plans are." John glanced back at Sherlock who stood impatiently with his arms out when he saw his friend still on the phone. "Call me if you need me."

"I will…I love you…bye." Mary had no sooner ended the call before her phone began buzzing again. She sighed heavily, truly wanting to just take a nap for the time being. "Hello," she answered, trying to sound cheery.

"Mary, hi, how are you doing," Mrs. Hudson's voice kindly came through.

"I'm fine," the blonde replied. "I was just about too head over there."

"Yes, that's why I'm calling," Mrs. Hudson relayed, in her regrettable tone. "I've got to run out quickly. Bit of an emergency."

"Oh no, I hope everything's alright."

"It's fine, dear. But my sister just called, she fell and thinks she may have broken her arm. She'll be fine, but there's no one to bring her to the hospital. So—"

"No, don't worry about it. Go take care of your sister. I'd quite like a nap anyhow." Mary felt sorry for Mrs. Hudson's sister, but relieved that she could stay at her own flat. She sort of resented the idea that John always tried to get someone to babysit her when he was gone. "And don't worry, however long it takes, that's alright."

"Thank you, Mary," the older lady gratefully responded. "Molly's off today, why don't you give her a call You two can have a girls day out…won't get many of those after the baby comes."

"It'll depend how I'm feeling," she politely said. "Bit worn out now."

"And why shouldn't you be!" Mrs. Hudson thanked Mary for understanding a couple more times and then hurried off the phone to go tend to her sister.

Mary switched her phone to silent and laid back down, struggling only for a minute or so to find a comfortable position. She fell asleep in no time and slept soundly for about fifteen minutes. That's when she was woken up by another contraction. She tried to fall back asleep, but twenty minutes later the same thing occurred. "Ugh," she groaned, rising from the sheets and rubbing her abdomen. "You don't want to give mummy a break, do you?" It bothered her just a bit that she desperately wanted to give birth, but her body insisted on teasing her like this. They were a bit more than they had been previously, but she figured that made sense enough. Indeed, her body was practicing for labor, and so it was only logical that the practice should become more similar to the real thing as she got closer.

She decided a short walk around the block would help. Every time during the past week that she had had a lot of Braxton contractions, she and John had gone for a short walk which usually made them subside.

OOOOO

In Slough, the investigation was taking a lot longer than John had anticipated, but only because they were uncovering more and more with every sweep of the property and inquiry of the victim. "He had to have been here last night," Sherlock orated with John and the client, called Tom, following at his heels. "There's footprints in the dirt by the driveway that aren't powdery, they're perfectly formed, solidified even. Clearly the hardened mud from last night's rain made them that way. So, he was here sometime between eleven o'clock and there in the morning. But why? Nothing was broken into; no pictures for further threats were taken. So why come when it could only be a risk with no benefit?"

"Maybe he was getting in the zone," Tom suggested.

Both Sherlock and John turned around giving him a dumb look. "Getting in the zone?" Sherlock questioningly repeated.

"Yeah, criminals do that, don't they? Stalkers especially? The night before they commit a crime they scope out the place, get a feel for the area, you know, it's like a pre-game morale thing…"

"Probably stop talking now," John suggested.

Sherlock went ahead and lambasted him anyway. "Issue number with your theory: you watch too many movies; real-world criminals don't do little symbolic warm-ups before they commit their crime. They just get in, do it, and get out. Issue number two: are you that forgetful is it just your ego; this person is not interested in you, he's not stalking _you_. He's using you as a tool to get to your uncle, Major James Sholto. So, he has no reason to stand outside and stare at you longingly through the window. And number three: If he was here last night, and had opportunity WHY wouldn't he take it?"

Tom hung his head and resolved no to make any more suggestions while Sherlock continued to aggressively mull over what they already knew. When he looked back up, he saw Sherlock appeared to be having a fit, grunting and groaning, pulling imaginary things from the air. It was slightly jarring. "Um, what's he doing?" he whispered discreetly to John.

"Mind Palace," John answered, getting the look he usually got from clients when he said those words. "You just have to wait for it to be over."

The look of concern did not leave Tom's face though. "Sorry, is he going to be alright?"

"Got it!" Sherlock suddenly yelled, emerging from his thoughts. He hastened over to Tom and grabbed him by the shoulders. "Did you stay here last night?"

"You mean in my house?"

"Yes! Of course in your house, were you here last night?!"

"Yeah I was here." Tom was getting progressively wary of the detective's methods. "Why?"

"And you don't go out much at night?"

"Hardly ever, don't much like the crowds and the—"

"Don't care," Sherlock quickly cut off. "You said you're girlfriend lives here with you, that right?"

"Yeah, but she wasn't here last night."

"No?" John questioned.

"No, she's a nurse. So, she usually works nights and then she's home all day."

"Where is she now?"

"Well, she's on a plane to Paris. She's heading out there for a bachelorette party for one of her uni friends. That's why I couldn't meet you until nine this morning. I had to bring her to the airport. Is that important?"

"Is it important…" Sherlock mockingly mused, hurrying back to the house. "It's everything! John we've been thinking about this all wrong."

John and Tom chased after him, nearly running into each other when he stopped short at the front door. "You want to fill me in?" John asked, catching his breath from the haul.

"Our original theory was that the stalker was going to use Tom as leverage to pull Sholto out of his secure and secluded lifestyle. But he's not. He said he wasn't trying clever this time, so what's simpler than a ransom situation?"

John just shrugged. "I don't know, if he wanted to be simple he could just find James Sholto and not bother with Tom."

"Exactly." Sherlock gripped the door knob, ready to push it open. "He wasn't stalking Tom; he was waiting for him to leave. He's going to get Sholto's contact information straight from one of the few people who'd know it, his nephew."

"So, why was he talking pictures of me and sending them?" Tom asked, quite rightly.

"The pictures were to collect data, such as schedule and that, and then he sent them to you to chase you off. Get you feeling scared, maybe you'd leave. That's what he was checking last night, and probably most nights before that. If he got you out of the house, then he could get into the house and search for Sholto's information. His problem was there was always someone home. So what could possibly make two people evacuate? Threats of a stalker, obviously. When you and your girlfriend both left this morning with bags packed and airport tags on them, he saw his chance."

"Does this mean he's already got James' address and all that?" John anxiously asked.

Sherlock didn't answer right away though. He instead turned to Tom again. "What time did you leave for the airport?"

" 'Bout seven," the younger man responded.

"And we got here just past eight…" Sherlock gazed down at the door handle still warm in his grasp. "I'm guessing you don't keep your uncle's contact information in an easily accessible place."

"No sir, I know what his life has been like since…you know."

Sherlock looked to both of them and tried to hide the smile forming on his lips. "He's still here."

"What?! In my house?"

Sherlock nodded. "John, take out your gun he might be armed."

John let out a frustrated sigh, but pulled it out of his belt anyway. "You've got to stop assuming I carry this wherever I go."

"Oh, it's not an assumption…ready?" John nodded as always, and Sherlock swiftly pushed the door open.

OOOOO

Mary's walk didn't last long, and had done nothing to ease the pain she was in, nor did the freezing air outside. Coming back into the flat, she leaned her back up against the door, waiting for the cramping in her stomach to stop. It did, clocking in at 98 seconds. She closed her eyes, relaxing into a deep exhale and then rummaged through the bulk of her winter jacket for her phone. "Hello, Dr. Marshall, it's Mary Watson….yeah, I've been having Braxton contractions all morning and…" she tried to conceal the excited nervousness shaking her voice. "They seem to be getting more regular…"

"Are they getting more painful or closer together?" The doctor asked on the other line.

"Um, bit more painful, not closer together. They go between ten and fifteen minutes apart. I tried walking, but it didn't help."

"Alright, well, have John keep track of them," Dr. Marshall said nonchalantly, but comfortingly. "You're past your due date so it could be the start of labor, but if they aren't getting closer together even though you've had them all morning then it's probably just more Braxton. But do call me if anything changes, yeah?"

"Yeah, okay." Mary said her thanks and goodbyes and ended the call. Sadly, she slumped over to the couch and flicked on the television. With her head hung back, barely paying attention to the program, she wrapped herself up in a blanket and tried to take her mind off of it. No doubt that constantly thinking about when she was going into labor could easily make her feel symptoms that just weren't there—as she had last time.

OOOOO

 **Thank you for reading! As always, reviews really let me know what's working and what isn't.**

 **Also, on an unrelated note, seeing the special has made me absolutely desperate for John/Mary fanfics so if you can suggest any or have written any PLEASE pm me the links! Thanks!**


	15. Chapter 15

"Sherlock, we've been through the house twice, he's not here," John said, leaning back against the wall disappointedly. "We're wasting our time."

"He has to be here!" Sherlock shot back. "It makes no sense; in the span of an hour he couldn't have come in, found the information he needed and then headed out without us seeing him. Tom, is there anywhere in the house we've not looked?"

"No, no we've been everywhere…" Tom answered, trying to think if he had missed anything.

"We got here too late," John regrettably but firmly stated. "We should be more focused on making sure James is alright now."

"No, no," Sherlock persisted, "he's here! There's just something we aren't thinking of…" He racked his brain hard, while John and Tom exchanged pessimistic looks.

"Something weighing on your mind, mate?" Tom asked John casually, as if trying to escape the extraordinary and unsavory reality he was currently experiencing.

John took a look of surprise by the out of place question, but gave it up anyway. "My wife's nine months pregnant…and I'm here…with you." Tom mouthed an 'oh.' "No offense."

"Ah! That's it!" Sherlock exclaimed, getting back on the same level as his companions. "John, you stay in here, keep your gun out and ready. Tom, with me. Now!"

"Wait!" John yelled, before his friend could whisk away. "What's the big revelation?"

"We've been together the whole time, the three of us…"

"Yeah…"

"We've moved between the inside and the outside several times while we were looking for him, but we all stayed together," Sherlock explained. "He's outside, probably up against the house. He knows if he leaves we'll see him so he can't yet. He's got to wait until we do."

"Simple enough," Tom said, now beginning to fear that he was going to come face to face with his stalker.

"Tom and I will go outside, go around the house in opposite directions, if he tries to run he won't get very far."

"Why am I inside then? He could be armed and neither of you have the gun, I do," John objected, not wanting to send his comrade into battle with a convicted attempted-murderer without protection.

"Neither of us has a baby on the way either," Sherlock said concisely, and then checked with Tom. "At least, I assume…" Tom shook his head to confirm. "Alright, let's go."

John tried to oppose once more, but the two other men left before he could. So, he stayed in with is weapon cocked and ready, hoping the man they were after was not carrying one as well.

OOOOO

The sounds coming from the television had now just become white noise in the quiet flat, since there was absolutely no chance of Mary paying attention to it. She wholeheartedly tried not to think about the baby, to fill her mind with thoughts of anything else, but she couldn't help it. Eyes wandering, she glanced out the living room window where a snow flurry had begun to powder the trees and window sills of the houses across the whitened street. It was peaceful, and for a split-second it even allowed her to feel relaxed. That feeling, however, was short-lived.

She suddenly sucked in an involuntary breath through gritted teeth as her stomach began to tighten again. This one had a bit more kick. Once over the surprise of it, she picked up the paper and pencil she was keeping by her side and wrote down the time as the abdominal constriction went on. Unfortunately, this one was not any closer than the last, a realization that made the pain of it seem even worse. Wincing just a tad, she rubbed at her belly, counting the seconds passing in her head. Seventy and it was over. "Whew…" she exhaled, staring down at herself. "Easy darling…"

She didn't want to deal with her mind playing tricks on her again, as she had been all morning, so she reached for her phone on the coffee table and dialed the number one. "Odd…." she murmured when John didn't answer. She didn't bother leaving a voicemail message. She really only wanted to hear his voice. She called one more time, but still got no response. Trying not to over think the reason behind the silence, she put the phone down and scooted to the edge of the couch. It took all her strength and the help of the coffee table as support, but she was able to push herself up off the seat and head to the kitchen. She really couldn't wait for the day when moving would no longer be such an imposition.

On the counter, a tiny booklet caught her eye. It was one of many of its kind—John's case notebook. Delighted, Mary managed to somewhat distract herself from all the frustrations of not yet being in labor as she flipped through pages of notes on cases, clients, and clues. These were undoubtedly the skeletons of what would later become more fleshed-out blog entries. He had even included some possible titles in the margins: The Mobile Bachelor, The Dancing Mentalist, The Military Cyclist… They all sounded good, and she could vaguely remember hearing about them when they were actually going on.

Not long after finishing the details of The Six Leon's, her reading was interrupted by a double-ring on the doorbell. "Afternoon, Kate," she accommodatingly addressed, opening the door fully to allow her neighbor in.

"Oh, I can't stay," the other woman politely informed. "I've just come to give you this." She thrust an envelope into Mary's hands. "It came to my flat, but it's got John's name on it…figured they must have written the wrong address."

Mary checked the return address and raised her eyebrows in surprise. "Harry? That's a surprise. Thanks for bringing it by, you're sure you don't want a cup of tea?"

"Absolutely, thank you though," Kate said, waving a hand. "Isaac's taking me out to dinner. He's got a new job."

"Oh, that's lovely, enjoy!" Kate smiled wider than Mary had ever seen and just about skipped away. After seeing she got down the stairs alright, Mary receded back into her own home. Slicing the envelope with a fingernail, she extracted Harry's card from inside. It was a pastel-yellow card with a stork on the front and 'Congratulations on your bundle of joy' printed across is in a playful font. 'Well, she tried,' Mary chuckled to herself, staring out the window at the slow fall of snowflakes. Abruptly though, she stopped when a strange feeling hit her. Almost like a 'pop.'

Her eyes instantly widened in recognition and shot down to the floor. "Oh my God," she uttered. Her water broke and was now in a small puddle by her shoes. "Oh my God," she repeated, much happier this time as she scrambled back to the couch for her phone. She called John only to have the call again go to his voicemail. "Ugh," she scoffed, knowing he would certainly want to hear about this. She tried Sherlock instead, and thankfully heard his deep 'hello' after the first ring. "Sherlock, I need to talk to John!" she excitedly told him, practically doing a dance in the living room—until she heard something in the background. "Is that an ambulance? Please tell me he's not in it…" Panic promptly set in.

"No, no, that was for the stalker, a.k.a. your erstwhile wedding photographer. John's fine, although he's with the EMTs right now, can this wait?"

"No, it can't wait!" Mary's eyebrows furrowed. "Why's he with the EMTs?"

Sherlock begrudgingly began the trek over to where John was being taken care of. "He had a small altercation with the perpetrator; sliced up his hand on the bloke's nose ring."

"Oh, well was it bad? Why does he need EMTs for one cut?"

"Several cuts, actually," Sherlock lowly corrected. "He punched him quite a few times."

"Alright then, please just let me talk to my husband," Mary begged, bringing a hand joyously to her stomach.

"Mary…" John's voice came through, already sounding worried. "I just saw the missed calls. What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong," Mary assured him through a laugh and an ear-to-ear grin he couldn't see but could certainly hear in her voice. "But, uh…my water broke."

His eyes went wide and his chin nearly fell off his face. "Your—your wat—…oh my god, are you sure?" he stammered, realizing immediately how stupid a question that was. Mary answered it anyway without making fun of him. "Alright, so you're in labor…jeez, God, you're in labor?!" He was rapidly entering panic mode, complete with the sudden onset of eye-popping nausea and a desperate need to quickly find something to hold on to so he wouldn't stagger into a heap on the ground.

"Mmhm, looks that way."

"Christ," he grabbed his forehead and ruffled his hair, swirling around trying to find Sherlock. "Sherlock!"

"Yes?" He was still behind him.

"We need to leave," John commanded, already hustling to one of the cruisers and then returning to Mary. "I'll be there as soon as I can, okay…and you're alright?"

"Yeah, I'm alright," she assured him, still smiling. "I guess it wasn't Braxton Hicks at all…"

"Wait a minute, you mean you've been in labor all morning?" He checked his watch. It was already 12:45.

"Uh-huh," she admitted, feeling silly for being so upset about _not_ being in labor all the while it had actually already begun. "Hurry home please; I don't think I can drive."

"No, no don't drive! Just wait for me to get there and if the contractions get closer than five minutes apart or the pain gets too bad, call Mrs. Hudson or Molly or an ambulance. Just don't drive." Mary complied and then made John hang up, knowing that he would stay on the phone if she didn't. Stuffing the phone back into his pocket, he once again spun around to see Sherlock. "I can't believe this, the ONE day I let you drag me out to Slough Mary goes into labor."

"John, don't be hysterical," the taller man said, perfectly even-toned.

"I'm not hysterical," he defensively shot back. "I just need to get home. Excuse me, officer…"

"Yeah?" The cop acknowledged, coming off of the hood of the cruiser he was complacently leaned up against.

"We need a ride to the train station," he said firmly, unwillingly to take anything less than 'yes, right away, sir' for an answer. "And I mean right now."

The cop's eyebrows disappeared up into his hat. "You must be joking…there's an escaped inmate in handcuffs over there. We can't just leave 'cause you've got somewhere to be."

"We just caught you that inmate," John pointed out shortly. "The police work's already done, there's three more cops and two other cruisers here, and you're not playing a huge part of anything. All that suggests you _can_ 'just leave.'"

"Nicely done," Sherlock sardonically commented as the cop stomped away from them.

"What the hell does he have to be pissed off about?" John berated, watching the grump approach his superiors. "Great, now the D.I.'s coming over."

"Funny, I never knew you to be one to head-butt with the Scotland Yarders so easily."

"You afraid of copyright infringement?" John quipped back.

"John Watson," the head cop checked, joining the two men by the cruiser. John nodded, visibly annoyed that he was not en route to a train station yet. "Wes says you're asking him for a ride to the train station."

"Yes, I need to get back into London. My wife's—"

"In labor, I know." the D.I. finished, surprising John. "Your friend told me. I'll drive you two back to London myself, it'll be faster. Besides, this guy escaped a month ago without a trace; we owe you." He dismissed his irked subordinate and lead Sherlock and John to his cruiser which was conveniently out of the way of the others and sped off.

In between thanking the police officer and incessantly checking his phone for any update from Mary, John tried to take as many slow and calming breaths as possible. Nothing else was said, until about ten minutes into the thirty-minute drive. "This is a different side of you," Sherlock said to him, glancing over at his friend's heaving chest.

"What?"

"Usually stress doesn't affect you; you thrive on it, if anything. You've fought in wars…probably saw more tragedy in a month than most people do in a lifetime. All that was more stressful than this, but look at you."

"Stop talking."

"This is how you've been for weeks, but now you've really kicked it up a notch."

John's teeth clenched just a bit behind pressed lips while he stared hard at Sherlock. "War was not more stressful than this… this is… I don't even know what this is." He racked his brain for the words, but there was no articulate way to verbalize the fear, excitement, nausea, uncertainty, and nightmarish thrill he currently felt. "This is my wife bringing my child into the world. If anything happens to either of them…" He couldn't, nor did he feel he had to, complete the sentence. And to his relief and surprise Sherlock appeared to understand this. A few more seconds went by, when John's head suddenly snapped back up. "You told the cop Mary was in labor?"

"Yes," Sherlock responded resolutely.

"But you were with me when she called…" His teeth bit into the side of his cheek and glared at the man in the seat next to him. "Did you know?"

"Know what?"

"Did you know Mary was in labor and not tell me?!" he repeated much louder for him. "Clearly you had to have told the cop about it before the phone call."

"It was a precaution," Sherlock said in a mumble, and John's look became instantly incredulous. "I had a hunch and wanted to be prepared."

"You know, you're unbelievable," he growled shaking his head. "You had a 'hunch' that my wife was going to go into labor and you still took me on a case half an hour away to catch a guy who'd probably like to kill both of us…Who does that?!"

"Well we caught him, didn't we," Sherlock hastily replied, much calmer than his counterpart. "And besides, balance of probability indicated no real need to worry."

"Balance of—are you kidding me?!" John responded in disbelief.

Sherlock sternly turned to him and delivered his reasoning. "Major James Sholto's life was in danger, as was Tom's. That was a guarantee. Next to the _possibility_ of Mary going in labor, the immediately dangerous threat took precedence. Moreover, even if Mary was to start having contractions, you'd still have plenty of time to get back to her in time. From what I've read, labor can apparently take hours; days even, for particularly merciless offspring. So, again, balance of probability indicated no real need to worry."

John didn't seem quite as angry at Sherlock; still, he was a far cry away from giving him a pat on the back. For the moment though, he decided to be content to believe him. No real need to worry. At least not now.

OOOOO

In London, Mary paced across the kitchen floor with the phone to her ear and a hand on her back where the normal aches and pains of pregnancy had significantly increased in the last twenty minutes. Finally, her intended recipient picked up. "Molly, hi, it's Mary."

"Hey, I was just about to call," Molly answered cheerfully, before picking up on the slight trill in Mary's tone. "Are you alright? You sound a bit flustered."

"Um, well yeah, you could say that," Mary got out, rubbing at the small of her back. "My water broke not too long ago… and I was doing okay, but the contractions are getting worse now, and…I'd really like not to be alone. I didn't know who else to call."

"John's not with you?" Molly asked in surprise, processing the news.

"No, he went with Sherlock to Slough, and Mrs. Hudson's sister fell off of something, and I'm trying to just watch TV and ignore the pain, but there's nothing good on—"

"Alright, of course I'll come, I've just left work." Molly quickly cut across two traffic lanes, getting a few angry honks as she went, and turned onto the road headed for John and Mary's flat. "I'll be right there. Ten minutes."

Mary set the phone down and leaned her hand against the counter, taking a deep breath in. Her water had only broken twenty minutes ago, and already the pain was becoming challenging. She glanced down at the piece of paper on which she had been recording the contractions, grimacing when she saw that she was likely due for her next one in the next couple minutes. She thought she could hold out until John and Sherlock returned, but, like her husband, she too had her fair share of nerves bubbling around inside her at the thought of something going wrong.

Just then, her phone began buzzing against the marble of the countertop. "John, where are you?" she asked straightaway.

"It's Sherlock…"

"Why do you have John's phone?" She inwardly prayed it was for a good reason and not a terrible one.

"Uh, well," the detective hesitantly began, knowing he was about to be yelled at. "We're all fine, but there's an accident up ahead of us…the highway's gridlocked…not moving…at all."

Mary's heart sank. "And John?"

"He's… sprinting up ahead to find out how far away the accident is," Sherlock reported.

Mary's brow wrinkled. "But, John texted me…he said you were in a police car. Can't you just turn the sirens on and go through?"

"Yup," Sherlock responded, popping the 'p' to convey the silliness of the whole thing.

"God, he's gone absolutely mental, hasn't he…"

"Admittable." Regrettably, Sherlock glimpsed at the traffic up ahead. "Mary, I'm sorry but, if there aren't any other responders at the accident yet…well," he searched for the delicate way of putting it, which as not something he often did for anyone other than Mary.

"I know, you are in a police cruiser after all," she sighed grievously. "Just catch up to John and get him back in the car. I don't need him to get run over."

"Right."

Mary felt yet another spike of pain crescendo up her abdomen and immediately keeled over to subdue it best she could. "Sherlock, I've got to go, I'm having another contraction," she wheezed out, tossing the phone away and trying to breathe through what was happening to her. She was a trained special agent. She had endured injuries and accidents any squeamish person would not be able to handle, but nothing, absolutely _nothing_ , felt like this. And the worst part of it was, she knew, this was still the beginning; this was the bearable and manageable labor pain. What the hell was to come?!

The contraction lasted, in total, about sixty seconds. Picking up the pencil with her hand still a tad shaky, she inscribed the time into her notes for John. This was truly her reason for calling Molly. She hadn't had a problem timing them at first, but now it was becoming difficult to concentrate on anything except the pain.

Molly was spot on with her ten minute ETA, and Mary graciously flung the door open when she heard her muffled voice on the other side of it. "How are you doing?" Molly asked calmly as she pulled off her gloves following Mary inside. There were snowflakes on her hair and hat that she dusted off as she came in.

"I'm doing alright, but just alright," Mary said with a small chuckle. "Thank you so much for coming over, the boys were supposed to be back by now, but they got stuck."

"I can't believe they would go on a case and leave you alone," Molly scoffed, helping Mary lower herself into the couch after taking note of the pregnant woman's struggle.

"I wasn't supposed to be alone, I was supposed to go to Baker Street, but Mrs. Hudson had an emergency. It's partly my fault anyway," Mary admitted. "I was so tired of John fussing over me all the time, I told him to go."

"Still," Molly continued to chide the men, and put a comforting hand on Mary's shoulder. "How about I get you some tea?"

Mary smiled appreciatively, but shook her head 'no.' "Thank you, but I don't think it'd be much help. There's a pot already made; help yourself."

Molly accepted the offer and moseyed into the kitchen, catching a glimpse of Mary's notepad on her way over. "Are these all the contractions?" Mary nodded her head. "Eight minutes apart already?"

"Is that all?" Mary said, only half-joking before her face contorted into another wince. "Ooh, speaking of…ahh," she straightened herself up and brought both hands to either side of her stomach as another contraction began rippling through her.

Molly had no idea what to do, but stuttered some comforting words as she rushed over to Mary. "Alright, um, just breathe, probably…" she attempted, rubbing her shoulder hoping it was making some sort of difference. "That's it…" Molly kept her eye intently on her watch, tracking the second hand with diligence. "There you go, nearly done now…"

Mary continued on breathing in and out, the way John had told her to during one of the times he wasn't freaking out about impending fatherhood. Although, she didn't think it was helping; she was convinced women only did this during labor so that they would have something other than pain to think about. Finally, the pain died down and her body relaxed back into the couch. "How long was that one?" she exhaled, positive it was longer than the last.

"60 seconds exactly," Molly answered, dutifully pulling the notepad from her pocket. "Just like the last ones." She penciled it into the growing list and discreetly glanced at Mary who was still very much taking her time breathing. "I'm sorry, Mary…I don't—I don't know how to do this."

Mary smiled and patted Molly's hand sweetly. "It's my first go at it too. And you being here is enough, really."

Molly reciprocated the smile appreciatively. "If you like, I can try to get in touch with Sherlock again…"

Mary nodded. "Please."

The morgue specialist hurried to reclaim the phone she had left in a heap with her purse and winter wear on the kitchen table, which gave Mary the chance to close her eyes and lay her head back. What had previously been a dull soreness in between contractions before was intensifying with every clench of her abdominal muscles. She just wanted John there with her.

John, fidgeting with a gum wrapper he had picked from his jeans pocket, wanted the exact same thing. Unfortunately, simple wishing couldn't make the cruiser go any faster, nor could requesting such to the cop driving it. "I'm going to miss the birth of my child…what a tit I am. Why did I go with you?" he mumbled disgruntled at Sherlock.

"We're almost there; you aren't going to miss anything." Sherlock said, scrolling through his phone. "Molly's just sent me a list of all of Mary's contractions. Here, take a look." He passed the phone to John after reviewing the data himself.

"Oh God, they're already 7 minutes apart…" John bemoaned, running his fingers coarsely over his scalp. "Is this all Molly sent?" Sherlock nodded and John sadly returned the phone to him.

Sherlock watched as his friend continued to nervously fiddle with all the little things he could get his hands on: the end of his coat, a string on his sleeve, his own fingernails. "John, listen to me."

"Huh?"

"In a very short time, Mary is going to need you. And it's not helpful to her if you're like this, is it? So, get yourself under control and set the dial to soldier, because you're both going to be basket cases and it'll probably be useful if the one that doesn't have to push another human being out of their body can provide some support to the one who does!"

Slightly surprised by the sudden assertion of direction, John just stared for a moment; though he knew Sherlock was right. "You've been worried about the pregnancy and the baby too, how come you're suddenly so calm?"

"Being hysterical isn't an advantage, and maybe staying calm isn't either, but it's at least more convenient."

John sighed and turned to the window. "I know Mary needs me…that's why I'm getting all the crazy out now."

The detective gave a stoic nod. "Let's hope so."

OOOOO

"They're five minutes out!" Molly announced to Mary, knowing the mum-to-be would be thrilled. "Can you hang in there for a bit longer?"

"I have so far," the blonde replied, with a small smile, rubbing at her tummy with one hand and holding her back with the other.

OOOOOOOOO

Almost at the end now! Thank you so much for reading and don't forget to leave a comment :) I like constructive criticism, so if you have some advice, I'm all ears! Also, I'm always looking for new Mary-friendly fanfics to read, so all suggestions are more than welcome. Cheers!


	16. Chapter 16

**Thank you to all who have stuck with it, that means SO much! Just a heads up: this will be the penultimate chapter…**

 **As always I LOVE knowing what you think, please review** **J**

OOOOO

The women's eyes darted to the door when they heard two sets of footsteps racing heavily up the stairs. In an instant, the door flew open and John came barreling in with Sherlock following close behind, dusting the snowflakes out of his hair. "Mary!" John let out in exhausted relief to finally be with his wife as he rushed over. Kneeling down in front of her, he could see she was in pain—her jaw was tight, her hands were stiffly clasping the sides of her protruding stomach, and her eyes swirled with the focus of a woman on a mission and the alleviation that her husband was finally by her side. "I'm so sorry I wasn't here sooner."

"It's alright, you're here now," she said with a genuine smile, cut short by a dull but shooting pain that she knew was a prelude to an upcoming contraction. "Did you catch him?"

"What?" John breathed confusedly. "Oh! The murderer, well would-be murderer, yes we caught him," he answered with a chuckle as he brought his hands over hers. He swallowed and looked down at her belly, trying to see if he could see it tensing. Unfortunately, he couldn't. "Molly, when was her last contraction?"

Molly quickly consulted the notepad. "'Bout seven minutes ago…"

John nodded and went back to Mary. "So, you're alright?"

"Yes," she replied quietly, swelling at the devotion and nervousness and excitement in John's eyes.

"Good, let's get to the hospital then, shall we."

"But it's still too early. Dr. Marshall said to wait until the contractions were five minutes apart."

"Well, as husband and soon-to-be dad, I'm getting a second opinion…Huh, second opinion says hospital now."

"Not sure that's entirely ethical."

His lips pressed into a small smile. "Are you ready to have this baby?"

A tiny pool welled in her eye and she nodded enthusiastically. "Yes, please."

"Sherlock, grab my keys and get the car. Molly, her hospital bag is in the bedroom, to the right of the dresser." Both of them immediately ran off to do as instructed. "Can you walk?"

Mary nodded her head again. "Yeah, I think so." John stood up, securing both his arms under hers, and pulled her off the couch. He led her out of the living room, and the pace was good enough, until another contraction made Mary curl over. "Ahh, that's another…"

"Alright, just breathe, just as we practiced…" John coached, though his face was not showing the same steadiness his voice was. He rubbed her lower back, knowing those pains were probably just as uncomfortable as the ones in front, and pulled her hair out of her face. "That's it. You're doing great, just breathe love…it's alright."

"I've got the bag!" Molly exuberantly reported, emerging from the bedroom. Her smile faded when she saw Mary hunched over and John holding her up.

"In the car, please," John politely directed. As Molly hurriedly left the flat, Mary straightened herself out a bit, catching her breath and leaning into John's body for support.

"This is less than fun," she quipped lightly, as they continued moving toward the door.

John kissed her head and did his best to help her walk, grabbing her winter coat off the rack as they passed through the threshold. "Sixty seconds…was that shorter than the last one?"

"Same," she told him, putting her arms through the coat he held up for her. "Let's keep moving, before Sherlock finds the game we packed for him in the hospital bag."

As John locked up their door behind him, Sherlock suddenly appeared at the bottom of the stairs. "Can't you two move any faster?!" he yelled up. "The game is on!"

OOOOO

"3 centimeters dilated," Dr. Marshall happily reported, pulling off her rubber gloves.

"Seriously, is that all?" Mary reacted disbelievingly, brows in a backward arch.

"Oh, I wouldn't worry. You've been in labor at least sixteen hours already," the doctor said, writing something into her patient chart. "Your contractions are getting consistently closer together. Things will start moving faster now." She shot the couple a smile and then made her exit.

Discontentedly, Mary took her husband's hand and let out a heavy sigh. "I really thought it would have been more."

"Sixteen bloody hours?!" John incredulously shouted, quickly regaining his composure for Mary's sake. "Sorry…" He looked up and did the math in his head. "That means you started at 10 o'clock last night. What the hell kind of doctor am I if I didn't even know my own wife was in labor…"

"In your defense, you have been quite mental lately," Sherlock chimed in from his place in the corner chair, flipping through a birthing brochure he had picked up in the lobby. "Good news Mary, apparently most women aren't in labor longer than 48 hours… so you're, at the very least, a third through it."

"God, only a third…" She fell back into her hospital bed dejectedly.

"Not helping, Sherlock." John scolded, rubbing Mary's arm. "How you doing, hun? Do you need anything?"

"I'm okay, and no," she replied shaking her head, "are you watching the monitor?"

John looked to the screen next to him and realized why she had asked. "Alright, you've got another one coming now…" he reported regrettably, and took her hand.

"Christ, they never end!" A second later, the next contraction circuited through her and she yelped out in pain, squeezing John's hand much harder than she had the last few times as waves of stabbing pressure clenched her body.

"Deep breaths, there you go…" John said, wincing a bit at her grip. If this was her in passive labor, he was almost positive active would completely break his hand. "It's almost over, keep breathing…"

"Stop telling me to breathe!" she shouted, moaning through the last ripples of pain until the incredible cramping very gradually subsided. Her body released and she collapsed back into the bed. "Ugh, how do people do this multiple times?"

John rubbed the back of her hand and pushed a tress of hair out of her face, feeling her skin begin to get a bit clammy by her hairline. "You've done wonderfully so far."

"Minus the complaining," Sherlock put in.

"Shut up, Sherlock!" Mary yelled to him, not having the energy to look in his direction. Her look immediately softened and the heavy heaves of her chest relaxed. "I'm so tired."

John sympathetically smiled down at her, putting a hand on her bump so he could feel his baby. "Why don't you try to sleep for a little while," he offered.

"And be woken up in seven minutes by another contraction?" she hopelessly retorted.

"Just try it, you might even get to sleep through some," he said soothingly. "Besides, it'll be easier to sleep now than it will be when you transition into active labor."

Mary could have objected again for the sake of stubbornness or spite, but she truly was exhausted. She resolved to at least close her eyes for a little while, and in just over a minute she was out cold. "How did she do that?" Sherlock wondered aloud to John who remained over the hospital bed staring at his wife and lightly rubbing his thumb over the back of her hand. "She was just in excruciating pain and now she's asleep."

"Labor is taxing on a woman's body," John told him, keeping his voice low so as not to disturb her. "Plus, I don't think she slept more than 4 hours last night."

"Women have been giving birth since the beginning of time; you'd think someone would have happened upon an easier way by now." He flipped the pamphlet closed and tossed it into the nearby waste basket. "I'm going to the morgue. There's a body down there with some spots I have to examine. Coming?"

John lightly chuckled. "No, mate, I'm staying here with Mary," he answered, lowering himself into the chair by her bedside.

"Suit yourself." When Sherlock left, John delicately returned his hand to Mary, staring up at her with admiration. She looked so beautiful, and peaceful too (apart from the subtle twitch of her nose and mouth when the next contraction came and went.) He was thankful she could sleep through it, since he had a feeling there were still quite a few hours ahead of them.

"How's she doing?" Molly asked Sherlock, watching him study the corpse she had laid out for his examination.

"Probably fine, she's dead," Sherlock said, still averting all his attention to the spotted body.

Molly rolled her eyes. "I meant Mary…"

"Oh," he realized foolishly. "She's sleeping. Hasn't been too hysterical thus far. I predict she'll opt for the epidural in 4 hours, and give birth around 9 o'clock."

"I thought she didn't want to use the drugs."

"She doesn't," he responded, checking behind the deceased woman's ear. "But based on the look on John's face and the redness of his hand during the last few contractions, that resolution will probably crumble after a while."

"Oh," Molly voiced meekly.

"Can't you get any better lighting in here?" he suddenly asked, violently pulling the hanging lamp closer to the table.

"Be careful!" Molly asserted instantly. "You broke the last lamp and I got the blame for it."

"The last lamp was even worse than this one. I did you a favor."

"You know, my shift was over this morning," she grumbled fruitlessly. "You aren't even supposed to be here."

"I never am."

"You should be upstairs helping John and Mary."

He pulled away from the corpse with a crinkled brow. "Help them do what? The whole procedure seems fairly straightforward."

"Not with that! With other things…emotional support."

"Emotional support…" he repeated with puzzlement. "I'm not exactly proficient in either of those things."

She had known it was a stupid suggestion even before she said it, but obstinately defended her point anyway. "You are perfectly capable of it, you just choose not to do it. You think it makes you look cool or something."

Before Sherlock could answer back, his phone began to buzz in his pocket. It was Mrs. Hudson. Molly could hear the excited, muffled shrills coming from the speaker as Sherlock succinctly explained to her what had happened. "No, there's no need to come now… it's going to be hours" he tried without any luck. "I certainly will not…how should I know…in the morgue, where else?" Molly was sure she heard the landlady scolding Sherlock now; his statements confirmed it. "There's no reason for me to be in the room. Maybe you should all tell me at once, form a nice little chorus…yes, fine….goodbye, Mrs. Hudson."

"She agrees with me?" Molly smugly inquired when the detective dropped his phone back into his pocket.

"Yes," he sulked.

"Off you go then," Molly said cheerily, as she rolled up the sleeves of her lab coat. "I'll put Mary-Ella Jr. back."

"Not yet," he halted, holding up hand. "I'm going to finish what I started, and _then_ go up. And considering I am going to be completely useless upstairs, John and Mary can certainly wait until after I've conducted a few tests."

Molly shook her head and sighed. "No chemicals. And don't break the lamp. I'm going to the loo."

Sherlock's examination took a bit longer than expected, not that he minded. By the time he had emerged from the morgue, the snow outside had accumulated in several inches on the pavement and the gray sky of earlier had turned into a navy, evening backdrop. "Five o'clock already," he mused, consulting the phone of a worker at a nurse station whose phone screen (recently checked) was just barely visible though the thin, pink fabric of her scrubs.

To his surprise, upon reentering Mary's hospital room, he found the bed empty and the previously occupied space completely vacant. Before he had time to concoct a deduction, he heard a loud clang come from behind the curtain that divided the room in half.

"Mary, please, back into bed," John's voice begged.

"No!" Mary shot back, which was followed by another loud clang. "You get into the bed! I'm staying here, I'll watch the snow fall."

Sherlock made his way to the curtain and pulled it back, revealing Mary who was up as close as she could go to the window, and John who stood behind her looking nervous and desperate. On the ground were two metal cups which the detective effortlessly knew had made the clang he heard before.

"Evening," he greeted, against his certain assumption that staying silent would be safer.

"Where have you been?!" Mary demanded, coming—with noticeable struggle—toward Sherlock. "I need you to take my husband somewhere, anywhere, go on a case. Just something!"

John had come over after. "Mary, I'm only trying to help, you know that."

"If you really wanted to help than you shouldn't have done _this_ to me!" she exclaimed, throwing her index finger illustratively in the direction of her stomach. She grabbed the rail at the end of her hospital bed to hold herself up.

"She's mad at me because I won't sneak in food," John informed him, situating his arms under his wife's for added support.

"I'm starving, I haven't eaten all day," she reiterated to Sherlock what she had been telling John for the past half hour.

Unsure of whose side to take, Sherlock looked from Mary to John cautiously. "I could probably run down to the cafeteria, and grab—"

"Yes!" "No!" The husband and wife said at the same time. Mary's head dropped in a grumbled moan, knowing she wasn't going to win this one.

"You know you can't eat anything yet," John said gently, comfortingly rubbing her back. He wished he could go get her something, and it was taking every doctor's muscle he had in his body not to send Sherlock out for a takeaway, but he stayed strong against the temptation. "I can get you some more ice chips…"

"No, no more ice chips," she groaned, tightening her grip on the rail. "Shit, here's another one…"

John watched her stomach muscles constrict and secured his hold on her. "Sherlock, get on the other side of her…" The detective did as he was told, intently watching as John rubbed her back and whispered encouraging words to his wife as she gritted and moaned in pain—clearly giving up on any breathing techniques for this one. It was over in just 30 seconds, but Mary looked beat.

"I want Dr. Marshall in here," she said, out of breath. "I need to know how much farther along this is. Sherlock, can you go get her?"

"Yes, right away," he obliged, hurrying out of the room, whether it was out of concern for Mary or nervousness of having to standby through another contraction which seemed to be a million times worse than those he left her with before.

"He's white as a ghost," Mary lightly chuckled, staring after Sherlock.

John smiled and rubbed her arm. "Do you want to get back in bed?"

"Not until Dr. Marshall comes in. Standing up is a bit easier," she said, wincing as she leaned her body exhaustedly up against her husband's.

"When the doctor comes back in, we can ask for an epidural, too."

Mary shook her head. "I don't want one."

"You can barely move you're in so much pain," he pleaded, hating having to watch his wife suffer. "It's not going to get easier."

"No, I want to hold off for as long as I can." She was persistent.

"You have, you've been amazing," John told her desperately, genuinely floored by her performance thus far. "Mary, please…"

She was still shaking her head though. "No."

He sighed and put his arm around her rejectedly, placing a kiss in her dampened hair. "Alright, but don't think you need to be a martyr. If it becomes too much—"

"I know, I know, I know."

John smiled and brought a hand to her stomach, hoping it would help a bit. It didn't seem to, though. "Maybe I can get you some sorbet…"

"No," Mary blurted immediately. "Don't leave."

He chuckled and pulled her closer. "I'm not going anywhere; I meant I'll send Sherlock for some." Mary breathed a relieved sigh, and then looked up toward the door where she saw Sherlock approaching with her doctor.

"Hello Mary," Dr. Marshall spiritedly greeted, coming into the room with Sherlock at her heels. "How are we doing in here?" John quickly gave her a synopsis of Mary's state as well as everything that had gone on since the doctor's last visit. Mary spoke when she had to, but for the most part she was just trying to manage everything going on in her body. "Alright, can you help me get her up on the bed?"

Unfortunately, Dr. Marshall didn't give much of a warning before taking a look at Mary's progress—at Sherlock's expense. John grabbed him by the neck and pulled him away when he saw the detective's fascinated, nauseated, and awkward expression, but the damage had been done. "Well," he whispered to his friend after being yanked away. "That was certainly…educational." John just rolled his eyes and leaned back against the wall while his wife was being checked. "A word of advice, John…if you ever want to have intercourse with your wife again and find it even mildly enjoyable, do not look at what's happening down there."

John shot him a look. "And if you ever want to breathe again, do not put that in your mind palace.'"

"That seems fair."

"Seven centimeters, you're almost in transition," Dr. Marshall said, pulling the blanket over Mary. "It shouldn't be too long now." Mary gave a weak smile and sunk into the pillow propped up behind her while Dr. Marshall turned her attention to John. "I'll be back around in about an hour, but if anything happens before then, just call. And Sherlock told me you were getting a bit hungry, so I put some popsicles in that cooler over there. Hang in there, Mary." She patted her foot and headed out, with the same chipper step with which she had arrived.

"I hate her," Mary mumbled when the doctor had left.

John raised an eyebrow. "What? Since when?"

"Since right now, how come she doesn't have to be in labor?"

"She practices better birth control than the two of you?" Sherlock suggested, earning a vexed look from both his friends. He didn't notice the daggers though; he was staring down at his phone. "Mrs. Hudson's arrived…says she's stopping in the gift shop. What could she possibly be buying? She's already filled up an entire closet at Baker Street with every toy and stuffed animal imaginable."

John glanced at Mary, seeing just how overwhelmed she was apparent on her face. "Actually, Sherlock, why don't you go check on her. You know, make sure she doesn't buy the whole place out."

"Good idea," the detective agreed, "since presumably I'll be the one having to carry everything home."

"Thank you, Sherlock," Mary told him before he made his departure.

When it was just the husband and wife, John sat down on the bed, facing Mary. "How are you feeling?"

"Like World War III is happening in my uterus," she answered, closing her eyes. "But other than that, great." John smiled and massaged her leg. "I want my baby."

"I think she'll be worth the wait," he reassured her, rubbing her tummy. When he did, he felt what immediately made Mary's face contort. "That's another contraction starting?"

Mary couldn't talk, but she nodded, bracing herself for the brunt of it as the pain came ripping through her body. "Oh God, John, this is the worst one" she cried, clutching his hand until his knuckles became even whiter than hers. She could feel his bones cracking within her grasp, but even still it did not relieve her pain.

"You're doing great, deep breaths now…that's it." His eyes watered with every second she had his hand, but he didn't dare show it.

Mary tried to breathe in and out, but it just wasn't working. "I need to push!"

John's eyes widened. "No! Jesus, Mary don't push!"

"Ugh, bloody hell!" Mary cried, panting and moaning through the waves of agony.

"You can do this," John said encouragingly, praying she wasn't pushing. "Only a bit longer…there you go."

The contraction passed and Mary collapsed back on to the bed, trying to catch her breath. "I can't do this anymore," she nearly wept.

"Yes, you can," John optimistically propounded, wiping the sweat from her forehead with a small towel. "You've done brilliantly so far…and she's almost here." He gave her temple a kiss and went back to rubbing her leg. "How about that popsicle?"

Clearly the incredible hunger had passed, because his wife shook her head apathetically. "I won't be able to keep it down."

"Are you nauseous?" John asked, becoming concerned.

"Bit, yeah."

"Eh, alright, well uh…" he stuttered, looking around for plastic cups. He found a stack in a cabinet by the baby monitor. "I'll just run to the bathroom to get you some water, okay…I'll be right back." The bathroom was only ten feet away, in the room and all, but he still felt he needed to reassure her that he was not going anywhere.

In the waiting room, Sherlock, Mrs. Hudson, and Molly all sat twiddling their thumbs. "How long has it been now?" Mrs. Hudson asked, breaking the silence.

Molly checked her watch. "Nearly 9 o'clock, so over twenty hours…"

"Twenty-two and a half to be precise, if Dr. Marshall's evaluation was correct," Sherlock corrected.

"Poor Mary," the landlady commiserated.

"Oi! You lot," a voice called, approaching the only group in the waiting room. "No baby yet?"

They all looked up to see Lestrade coming their way. Molly was the first to answer. "Not yet…did you come to see?"

"Oh, no, I was just," he tried to play it off, but forgot what his reason was supposed to be, "bringing in a junkie, thought I'd check in."

"No you weren't," Sherlock said without even looking.

"What?"

"Your hair's wet."

Lestrade ran a hand through it causelessly. "So?"

"So it's been snowing all day, if you had come in with a junkie you would have come in the ambulance which drives directly into the lower level terminal. Your hair is wet, so are your shoes, meaning you walked through the car park, meaning you came here on your own." The detective leaned back expressionlessly the way he always did. "Plus you reek of Thai food…unless, of course, the imaginary junkie made you stop for a takeaway."

"Real impressive." Lestrade dropped into a seat across from the crew.

"Please, even Mrs. Hudson could have put that one together."

"I was being sarcastic," Lestrade threw back.

"So was I."

The landlady scornfully smacked his arm, shutting him up quick. Molly, on the other side of him, decided to bring the conversation back to the reason they were all sitting there in the first place. "So, let's take bids, shall we? I say Mary has the baby at 10:30 tonight. Mrs. Hudson, what's your guess?"

"Ooh, I don't know," the woman said, smiling excitedly. "If I'm going on what Sherlock's told me, I'll say…midnight."

Molly turned to Greg, who took it as his turn. "I've never been good at making these kinds of predictions."

"You're kidding," Sherlock wryly quipped.

The D.I. frowned, but gave it some thought anyhow. "Tomorrow morning, sometime…let's say nearly eight."

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "You're all wrong. Granted, I was able to gather the most data being that I was the one in the delivery room the longest." He deliberated a bit longer, running through the calculations in his head. "Let's see, it's 8:58 now. I predict she'll give birth within the hour, sometime after 9:30."

Just then, the sound of footsteps hastening toward the waiting area snapped all their heads up. It was John, looking bewildered and slightly unaware of his surroundings. "Already?!" Mrs. Hudson joyously exclaimed, jumping up from her seat.

"Congratulations Mate!" Lestrade warmly boomed with an eagerly outstretched hand, also standing up to greet the new father.

For the first time, John realized there were people around. "Oh, hi…uh, no, no baby yet…Jeez, you're all here, aren't you. Wow, thanks…" he was truly appreciative, but still looked a bit like a deer frozen in headlights. "Sherlock, can I talk to you for a second?"

Sherlock privately moved off to the side with John, staring intently at the doctor. "What's wrong? Is Mary alright?"

"Um, yeah, technically I guess…" John answered, pushing his hands exhaustedly through his hair. "She tossed me out though…her contractions are getting really bad, she still won't get the epidural, and she completely hates me right now. She screamed at me to leave and I didn't, and then she starting pelting me with the ice chips. One of the nurses is in with her now…this is ridiculous!" The panic in him was starting to rise to apparentness. "It's bad enough I have to see my wife in the most excruciating pain I have ever seen another human being endure, that's coming from an army doctor by the way, but now she kicks me out so I can't even be there for her. Why won't the baby just come out already?!"

Sherlock had never seen John hyperventilate, but the possibility seemed to become more likely with every passing second. "Alright, just calm down…when did you leave Mary?"

"Just now, 'bout two minutes ago," John responded confusedly.

"Well, two minutes seems like long enough, maybe she's gotten over it."

"I can't decide if she's punishing me for actually getting her pregnant or just because I was the only other person in the room."

"Did you hear what I said?"

"It's probably the first one…"

"John!" Sherlock yelled, snapping him out of his trance and inadvertently startling a nurse who was passing the pair. "Go back in there. Mary's in pain, she doesn't mean what she's saying. She needs you in with her, so go back in there."

"I told her that! It made her even more pissed off."

Another nurse came hustling around the corner. "Doctor Watson…she's asking for you. She wants you to come back in."

"Oh thank God," John sighed in relief, running back to his wife's room. "Wipe that stupid smirk off your face!" he shouted back to Sherlock as he went.


	17. Chapter 17

**Here it is! The final chapter! ENJOY :)**

 **OOOOO**

When he reached the room again, Mary practically leapt out of the bed. "John!"

"I'm here," he said out of breath from his sprint as he met her open arms. "Please don't ask me to leave again."

"Please don't listen to me next time I do," she replied apologetically.

"Not a chance, don't you worry." He set his hand on her stomach to see if he could feel anything, but all there was were some minor spasms beneath his palm. "What do you need me to do?"

By now, her hair was soaked with sweat and she could barely hold her body up. "My back…" He didn't need any more information. John carefully propped her up and kneaded her lower back best he could in the tight space between her body and the pillows. Mary closed her eyes and, for just a moment, felt the throbbing ease up. It was a brief moment, though. "Oh God, come back, 'round front please, now…" she begged when the stabbing pains hit her stomach again.

He lowered her down gently and took her hand preparedly. "Here we go…look at me, alright. Deep breaths—sorry," he redacted, remembering her pleas for him to stop telling her to breath. John watched with adoration as she soldiered through it, only forgetting to breathe once. "Mary, you're doing fantastic, it's almost over."

"I need to push, John…I really need to push!" she cried, even more desperately than the last time.

"Not yet, not yet….you're nearly through it…only a bit longer." Finally, it ended, and she fell back into the bed. John wiped the towel over her head, trying to make her as comfortable as possible. "Perfect, you've done brilliantly…" he exhaled, as he kissed her hand gently, feeling a bit nauseous now himself.

"Call Dr. Marshall," Mary huffed out through still laboring breaths. "I _need_ to push on the next one."

At those words, John swallowed and nodded obediently with fixed eyes. "Right, yeah, okay…just hang in there, alright…" He went to the door to flag down a nurse. In the chaos of helping Mary through labor, he hadn't really had time to process the simple fact that now, at Mary's request to push, suddenly became so apparent. He was going to become a father...…probably within the hour.

He didn't even hear himself ask the nurse to get Dr. Marshall, nor did he recall how he suddenly was back at Mary's bedside holding her hand and pushing her wet hair away from her forehead. He just froze in an abyss of his own mind.

"John…John," Mary called to him, grabbing him from the daze. "What's wrong?"

He opened his mouth to speak, but then felt a smile spread into his cheeks. "Nothing," he beamed, "nothing at all…It all just kind of sunk in."

Mary smiled too, understanding what he meant completely. It was a nice moment, however short. A second later, Dr. Marshall came into the room, interrupting the grinning couple to have a look at Mary. "10 centimeters," she announced to John and Mary. "You'll be pushing on the next one, sound good?" Mary nodded wholeheartedly as the doctor positioned herself where she needed to be. Before any other instruction could be given, another contraction ripped through Mary and she immediately started pushing with every bit of strength she had left. "You're doing great, Mary, keep it up…seven, eight, that's it, nine, ten…okay, take a rest."

Mary collapsed into John's arms. "I have to do that again?" she whimpered, crushed by the mere thought of it.

"You've been amazing so far, you can do this," John said encouragingly, wiping the sweat from her brow and pushing a kiss onto her reddened forehead. "She's almost here."

"Right, here comes another one," Dr. Marshall said after what seemed like a completely insufficient rest.

"Oh God…" Mary moaned, sitting up to push again.

"Start pushing now, Mary," the doctor directed, "bit harder."

Mary screamed out in pain and strife as she tried to push harder than the last time, if that were even possible. "That's it, almost there now…" John cheered her on, trying to be the supportive and steadfast coach; but, in all honestly, he was terrified to see his wife this way…in so much pain and exerting so much inhuman strength. "One, two, three…"

"Shut up!" Mary shouted, teeth clenched even tighter than her fist was around John's now undoubtedly sprained hand.

"Keep pushing, Mary," Dr. Marshall joined in.

"You shut up too!"

She pushed for a bit longer and then, when the doctor finally gave her the 'okay,' fell back into the bed in debilitating exhaustion. "How is this not over yet?" she rasped, staring up at the ceiling through low eyelids.

John put one hand behind her head and the other reassuringly into her hanging hand. "Just one more big push, that's all you have to do…one more. Also, I am never going to ask you to do anything ever again."

"Don't lie," Mary replied breathlessly, trying to stay in good humor.

"John, hold her up for this one," Dr. Marshall interjected, and John did as he was told. "Okay, Mary, are you ready to push again?"

"Do I have a choice?" she responded, bracing herself.

"Alright, deep breath… one more big push."

Mary pushed and pushed, channeling every moan and scream to strengthen her efforts. John and the doctor were rattling off encouraging words, she was sure, but she couldn't hear any of it. She couldn't see or hear much of anything, until the moment when every bit of pressure crushing her body finally let go. Then, one sound cut through the delirium of physical anguish.

It was her baby.

The wails filled the room, and she was immediately brought back to earth. It was truly unlike anything she'd ever heard. "Here she is!" Doctor Marshall said merrily, cleaning her up a bit and then placing the newborn onto her mother's chest.

"Oh my God…" was all Mary could clumsily gasp through the instant tears flooding her eyes and shaking her voice as she laid eyes on her child for the very first time. "John, look! Look at her…"

He already was, with eyes just as wet and proud and as ecstatic as Mary's. "…wow," he exhaled, stupefied. He gave his new daughter's head a light kiss, planting one on Mary's right after. "She's beautiful…"

"She's perfect," Mary blubbered, kissing her daughter and grabbing John's arm ecstatically.

OOOOO

In the waiting room, Mrs. Hudson, Molly, and Lestrade were occupying a very restless Sherlock with a game of 20 questions…each of them thinking of a separate item, which he insisted on to make it at least a bit challenging.

"Can it be frozen?" he directed at Molly who shook her head 'no.' Sherlock pondered the fact for a moment, depositing it into a temporary cognitive file folder. "Why hasn't John told us anything yet?!" he suddenly burst. "They must be finished by _now_."

"Sherlock, the game, dear…" Mrs. Hudson attempted, hoping they could stall him a little longer.

Thankfully, for all involved, quick footsteps dully began to echo behind them and they turned to see John coming their way smiling bigger than any of them had ever seen him smile before. A chorus of questions sprang from the group as they all hopped to their feet in their individual ways.

"Speak, man!" Sherlock anxiously boomed above the rest of them,

"Alright, alright, calm yourselves, we don't want a scene…" John smiled brightly, waiting a moment before sharing the news. "I'm a dad!"

"Oh, that's wonderful! Congratulations!" Mrs. Hudson sang, kissing his cheek and wrapping him in a hug. Greg clapped him on the back and gave his own "congrats, mate!" with Molly following suit with a hug and a "cheers!"

"She's 7 pounds, 2 ounces, and absolutely perfect in every way," he added, still grinning ear to ear.

He looked over to his best friend, and surprisingly found him smiling too. Sherlock held out his hand, and John took it heartily. "Congratulations, John," he said in a tone very few had ever heard him use…it was nearly _warm_.

John proudly thanked him, and the rest for their remarks. "Now, you can all see her if you want, but try to come in one at a time…Mary's exhausted. I'll let you lot fight over who gets to see her first," he smirked, heading back to his wife and child.

"I can go last, I've got nowhere to be," Molly volunteered, when John had gone.

"Maybe we shouldn't bother the two of them just yet," Mrs. Hudson thought out loud. "We waited this long, I can wait another day. Besides, this should be John and Mary's time with the baby." Lestrade and Molly agreed without hesitation. They had been so excited to see the baby, but after seeing how thrilled John was, it just didn't seem proper.

"Although," Molly added. "Maybe one visitor would be alright…" The three of them looked at the detective who didn't appear to have an opinion one way or the other; although, they knew better.

OOOOO

The door was open, so Sherlock walked right in. Mary was sitting up in the bed, looking completely worn out, with John next her. They were both beaming—no, glowing— at the white bundle she held in her arms. It was, if he ever was to admit that some things in life did indeed have the capacity to be such, the closest thing to beauty he had ever beheld.

The new parents wouldn't have known he was there if he hadn't accidentally crunched an ice chip under his shoe on his way in. "Sherlock," Mary said tiredly, though still shining with joy. "Come over here and meet your niece."

Apprehensively, he went to the bed and had a look at the baby. His initial assessment lasted for a measly three seconds. "Her nose is slightly scrunched," he observed, figuring it was from the birth and would go away in a couple days. "But other than that, she's entirely symmetrical." Mary and John chuckled and gave him a smirk. "Probably one of the best looking babies I've seen…though in fairness to the rest of the population, that number is incredibly small."

"Do you want to hold her?" Mary asked, staring at her daughter lovingly.

"Oh, I wouldn't know the first—"

"Sit over there," Mary commanded, not allowing him to make up an excuse. "John, here take her…" Carefully, she passed the baby to John who even more conscientiously scooted off the hospital bed to stand over the chair right near it.

"Put your arms out, be ready to support her head," John instructed, enjoying the fear of the task at hand on his friend's face. "And no deductions on my daughter."

"If you recall, you didn't know you had a daughter until I deduced it."

"I know, you remind us every day."

Sherlock would have gone on to say why he couldn't just turn it off, but before he could open his mouth the Watson baby was in his arms. It was an entirely foreign experience, but he made sure he was supporting her head at just the right angle, and that her other limbs were secure within the blanket. John stayed close, already settling into his protective father role nicely.

"Isn't she amazing," John mused, leaning back on the bed taking his wife's hand. "Mary did brilliantly."

"I'm sure she did," Sherlock remarked with a genuine smile at the new mother. He stared down at the sleeping baby, thinking about how strange she must have felt going so abruptly from a warm aquatic environment to a cool cotton one. "Have you decided what to call her?"

"We have," Mary answered, tiredly easing back with a smile as she watched Sherlock get to know the baby. "Violet."

"Violet Watson…it suits her." The detective nodded in approval of the name and continued to stare at the new life. "Well, John, you'll be happy to know, based on a quick assessment of the upper lip area and brow structure, that she is most definitely yours."

"Sherlock!" John reacted incredulously, appalled at the implication. Mary just rolled her eyes.

"Paternal anxiety is a common worry among new fathers," Sherlock tried, but simply could not see why his friend was offended. So, he went on with his evaluation of the baby's genes. "She has your eyes, Mary…and John's nose…bit of a mix in the mouth—"

"Yeah, take a break for one second and smile," John said, snapping a picture of Sherlock holding the baby. The detective didn't smile, and ended up looking even more nervous in the photo than he did in real life. "Now there's a nice one for the blog."

"How many pictures of the baby is that, hun?" Mary asked, closing her eyes a bit.

"Only fourteen I think, I'll get more when she wakes up, though…" he said, putting the phone away. He was truly beside himself. Sherlock had never seen him so elated. "Alright, it's daddy's turn again…"

"But I just got her…" The seated man protested.

"Well, technically, so did I," John replied, lifting his baby back into his arms. He stared down at her in awe, wondering how two people so flawed could make something so perfect. He looked over at Mary who was starting to nod off with a smile.

Sherlock saw the look in his friend's eye and stood up slowly. "I think I'll be off…"

"You sure you don't want to stay and start her education in the science of deduction?" John quipped.

The detective smiled. "Tomorrow."

John nodded with a smirk. "Thanks for coming to meet her, and for…everything else."

"Of course."

"Are the others coming in?"

"They thought Mary would want to recover a bit before being bombarded with stupid questions and overdone congratulations." John gave a confused look. "I'm paraphrasing."

"Ah."

"Thanks for being here, Sherlock," Mary said groggily from the bed. "I'm sure you were the one who made John come back in here after I kicked him out."

Sherlock gave her a smile and walked over to whisper something to her. "He's trying to pretend like his hand doesn't hurt, but from what I can see it's broken in at least two places."

Mary smiled back, glancing at John who was oblivious to anything except his new daughter. "It's a sprain. I'm a nurse; I know how to sprain someone."

"I'd have thought that'd be a skill from your previous profession."

She jutted her jaw in a playful glare. "Don't let Mrs. Hudson keep you up too late bringing all those toys and stuffed animals over to ours."

"She wanted it to be a surprise…"

"I heard her mention it last week," Mary said with a shrug. "It's very sweet, though I know it wasn't _all_ her idea." Sherlock didn't confirm or deny it, just tried to lay it off as no big deal. "Thank you…and tomorrow get ready to learn how to change a nappy."

He nodded with one last smile to the new mother. "Goodnight."

John said his goodbyes as well and, when his friend had left, went back to Mary. "Look at her…"

"I know," Mary responded, already staring. "She's amazing."

John looked from his wife to his daughter, and then back to his wife. "You know…after everything that's happened in the past few months…I really didn't picture such a happy ending."

Mary beamed and lovingly fixed the blanket where her baby's arm was beginning to slip out. "It's not an ending, is it…it's a beginning, I'd say."

John nodded in agreement.

They were staring at the most beautiful thing either of them had ever seen, and they made it together. All the ugliness each had endured in their lives and all the tribulation they had to come back from in the last few months seemed so trivial now. Silently, they were each making a promise in their heads. Their little girl would never have to see the horrors they had seen. And if the rest of their lives were spent ridding the world of that ugliness and those horrors, then that was alright with them…even exciting.

"I love you, John."

"I love you both."

 **OOOOO**

 **Thank you so much for reading, it truly means the world :) Please leave a review and let me know what you thought of it all, it'll be so helpful when I get to work on my next story!**

 **Note: Points to any Conan Doyle fans who can guess why the baby is called Violet ;)**

 **Again thank you! You're all lovely :)**


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